


Aegis

by TheWillOfMythal



Series: The Sword And The Shield [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: "heroic acts of sacrifice", 'cause Varric is the best friend anyone could ever hope to have., Angst, Blood and Violence, Cassandra & Varric's developing friendship, Established Relationship, F/F, Major Character Injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-06
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 05:54:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 23,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28595067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWillOfMythal/pseuds/TheWillOfMythal
Summary: After a Venatori ambush in the Hissing Wastes leaves Cassandra gravely injured, the Inquisitor is forced to consider an extreme option in order to save her, even if it could mean losing the Seeker's trust and affections forever.
Relationships: Female Inquisitor/Cassandra Pentaghast
Series: The Sword And The Shield [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2095260
Comments: 2
Kudos: 27





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So... This has been sitting on my desk for almost a year. Thought I would sit down, blow off the dust, polish it a little and finish it, because there can never be too many Female Inquisitor/Cassandra fics out there, right? AKA still haven't forgiven Bioware for making Cassandra as flexible as a bendy straw whenever the Inquisitor flirted with her, but as straight as an arrow for the actual romance part. It was... quite misleading.
> 
> Oh, well...
> 
> That's why we have fanfictions to fix such... inconsistencies.
> 
> Anyway, there are a few minor mentions of my other Female Inquisitor/Cassandra fic "Thaw" in this story, but you don't have to read that one to catch up with this.
> 
> Warnings are all in the tags, so you better buckle up for a long, bumpy ride on an angsty roller coaster.
> 
> That being said...
> 
> Enjoy

You don't even feel it the moment it happens.

The sharp point of the arrow pierces through your heavy armor, breaking the links of the chain mail worn underneath as a further (utterly useless, in such case) protection, with the same terrifying ease of a knife cutting butter.

All you saw was an archer peeking out from behind one of the few still-standing pillars half-swallowed by the surrounding dunes, aiming for her, and the next thing you know - without any long-range weapon at your disposal to go to the offensive, with no shield equipped, and with only your far-too-heavy mace to lift in an attempt to intercept the shot - you have done the second best thing that came most natural.

_If you couldn't be the sword..._

Without hesitation (and actually urged by an amount of certainty that would have had you livid were someone else doing such recklessness in your stead) you have used your own body as a shield and tackled the Inquisitor to the ground.

"Cassandra what the-!" Evelyn half-gasps and half-splutters, startled by the tackle as you land, heavily and ungracefully, on top of her, finding cover behind the rotten, dried-up trunk of a tree lying (conventionally) nearby.

With the adrenaline of the battle still pumping through your veins, pounding in your head at the same frantic rhythm of your heartbeat, and burning with the consuming fear of what was about to happen hadn't you intervened, is no surprise that pain doesn't register as it normally would.

"Oh, Maker!"

But it's still quite worrying that it takes hearing Evelyn's horrified gasp and catching the first, puzzling glimpse of a sharp, bright-red, glistening, metal, triangle-shaped point poking out from the left side of your chest - in that tender spot just beneath your clavicle, near the shoulder - for you to realize that-

"Cassandra!"

"Not the most appropriate of times for you two lovebirds to get overcome with passion and have a private moment!" Varric shouts (somehow amusedly even in the midst of battle) in response from somewhere on the field just before the unmistakable sound of his crossbow snapping two consecutive final shots followed by the muted thumps of two more enemies hitting the ground are heard.

"Nevermind. Bianca got the last one." He announces, heaving a slightly breathless sigh that sounds more like disappointment by the brief fight rather than the effort it required finishing it.

"Actually-" The sound of a sharp blade slicing flesh and a gurgling choking sound chime in next. " _I_ got the last one." Comes the thick, deep, rumbling voice of The Iron Bull.

"Anyhow, it's safe now," Varric counters, calling out for you. "You two can come out any moment... If you are decent."

It really says something about the severity of your current incredulous state, the fact that no half-flustered, snappy reply comes ready at his teasing misinterpretation of the situation. Were the circumstances slightly different, you might have even flared up with a glaring blush at his shameless implication.

"Varric!" It takes hearing the distress tainting Evelyn's usually smooth, suave voice to make the gravity of the situation sink in the rest of the party and shake you from your own, worryingly stunned state. And it is only because of the change of position - the combination of movements made as she single-handedly turns you over, lifting you with all your heavy armor from on top of her in an attempt to lay you on the ground - that the first shock of pain rings within your chest, shooting up your neck, throbbing simultaneously in your head and down your arm.

It's so unexpectedly sharp and vicious that you can't even bite back the howling cry that gets startled from your throat.

The _pain._

_Maker's breath!_

The pain makes it _so_ much real.

Suddenly feeling far more aware and in control of your own body and no longer seized by shock, one of your hands instinctively reaches up, wrapping angrily around the bloody shaft of the arrow poking out from beneath your spaulder, and-

"Wait! Cassandra don't-"

The rest of Evelyn's warning gets cut off by the snap of wood as you break off the point of the arrow in a single twist. Varric and The Iron Bull come rushing just in time to see your face contorted into the most painful grimace.

"Oh shit." Varric whispers, visibly startling at the sight he is met with, just as the Iron Bull mutters and curses something in Qunari that you imagine must translate into an equally eloquent swear to match the dwarf's.

"You fool! What in the Void were you _thinking?!"_

Evelyn, however, is not as much at a loss for words (or rather reprimands) as the rest of the group. And yet, even as she screams angrily at your (perfectly justifiable, in your opinion) protective foolishness, she cradles you in her lap, hands shaky with adrenaline and uncertain with worry as they assess the damage.

"You certainly put my writings of heroic gestures to shame, Seeker." Varric, as expected, not used to the sight of you hurt (and not exactly known to take anything too seriously, not even when things seem particularly dire - a trait of his behavior for which you are actually grateful, especially now) decides to make a quip out of it.

Out of habit, however, you still glower at him, although your murderous glare may not hold the same intensity you are usually able to pour in it, probably because part of you feels actually a bit flattered by the subtle, hidden... compliment coming from your favorite author? Not to mention that you might also feel a bit bad for the worry showing underneath that tentative, humorous smile twitching weakly at the corner of his mouth. And it really says something about how much the dynamics between the two of you (from captor and prisoner) have changed and evolved into a peculiar friendship, if you are able to recognize that smile and know that it's forced because it doesn't make the kind, warm, liquid amber in his eyes sparkle like gold.

To distract you (although not from the pain) is the Iron Bull, who steps closer with purpose, as if moved with a kind of urgency attributable by a sudden, striking, concerning thought.

He towers over you before crouching down - a massive, intimidating, gray mountain of bulging muscles lowering itself to your level.

Wordlessly, he reaches out to take the bloody, broken arrow point laying on the sand right beside you.

A sting of realization weaves itself in your own thoughts then. A whisper of a dreadful suspicion taking consistency at the back of your head. And given the way the air around you tenses, as if held by a collective breath, you realize that the others might have also reached the same conclusion.

Laying in the Iron Bull's large hand, the arrow point looks like nothing more than a splinter. It's almost comical, really. The only reason you aren't snorting at the image is because the pain has finally begun to sink its wicked claws into you, and that haze of doubt swirling through your head is growing thick enough to take an alarming consistency when, along with the throbbing down your arm, you register a warm, tingling, stinging-kind of feeling prickling around the entry wound.

"What is it, Bull?" Evelyn asks, the tremor in her voice reluctantly tipped towards the kind of realization that everyone must have already drawn.

The Iron Bull picks the snapped arrow point between two fingers, brings it up to his face and, after a single sniff, his brow furrows, and somehow it's even more worrying the fact that he remains calm when he states what you were dreading and already confident to state for yourself.

"It's poisoned."

There.

How marvelous.

What's a better way to end the day spent knee-deep into sand under the scorching heat of the sun, battling Venatori and whatever Maker-forsaken beastly creature the desert blew your way, than a healthy dose of possibly (most likely) deadly poison?

Uncertain of how strained your voice would sound if you dared to speak (because the last thing you want is risk worrying Evelyn further or worse- make her feel responsible for your decision) you choose to keep the sarcastic jab to yourself.

Although, despite that much expected, knee-jerk reaction, having The Iron Bull's expert confirmation has a way to make your stomach twist on itself with concern.

Or it could be the venom, too, you reason.

_Or even..._

"Do you know what kind it is?"

 _...Or_ it could be hearing the quiet distress weaving itself in Evelyn's voice; heavy with the effort it takes her to keep it steady under the weight of dreadful possibilities expanding their ramification with what you know must have been more the confirmation of a suspicion of her own rather than a realization.

In response, the Iron Bull examines the arrow point closer, takes another, longer, more purposeful sniff, and then, after a suspenseful moment... he nods.

"Yes."

You revel in the feeling of Evelyn deflating with relief before allowing your own weary, beaten-up body do the same with a long, albeit silent exhale.

"It appears to be the same spit by those Wyverns we have been fighting in the area." He supplies, and right then, Her Worship Lady Trevelyan, the Herald of Andraste herself, the very same woman who has made it perfectly clear since the very beginning doesn't believe in the Maker and thinks of the Chantry as the true abomination and ultimate evil responsible for the world's current shredded state and for all the mages' suffering - actually looks up at the sky and sends a silent prayer of thanks to the Heavens above.

Because, dangerous as they are, the Wyverns living in this area aren't as deadly as the dread ones roaming the Vimmark Mountains.

Once again, you find yourself fighting off the odd, totally inappropriate urge to laugh- at Evelyn, at your own luck, and this time, you fail in your attempt to keep the unexpected spike of humor from piercing through. Although, the laugh that escapes past your lips finds a way to twist itself into a hiss the moment you feel a sharp hot sting radiating through your chest and down your arm.

Struck by an overwhelming surge of annoyance and anger, your uninjured arm shoots up, hand wrapping once again around the broken shaft of the arrow still poking from your chest, and-

"Cassandra _don't_!" This time the warning sounds much more like the hiss of an angry command. The first one you actually decide to ignore as you try, although unsuccessfully, to stick out the arrow from your shoulder. The blood makes it far too slippery for you to get a proper grasp, which infuriates you even more.

"Stop! Cassandra, _please!_ " That plea, however, the desperation tightening your lover's voice, making it shake under the weight of the emotions that have been piling precariously in the past handful of minutes on top of each other, gives you pause.

"Just... Get this thing _off me_." You growl, releasing your grip at last, feeling betrayed by your armor, annoyed by the pain, frustrated by the crippling feeling of not being able to do so yourself, and, above all, furious for being responsible for putting that desperate tone in Evelyn's voice.

It's not the first time that, by protecting her, you have ended up causing her pain instead.

It might have become your specialty, actually.

"The Inquisitor is right. You can't remove the arrow." The Iron Bull agrees, launching himself into an explanation before you can get the chance to protest. "You'll bleed more, that means the poison will enter your bloodstream and affect you much faster."

It's disconcerting, to say the least, that the thought hadn't occurred to you. Pain or not you should be in a far clearer state of mind than your current one. Even though one of the first objectives on the field is for you to avoid this kind of outcome altogether, you have also been provided with the training and knowledge to face and endure the situations in case your primary objective failed.

Little do you know that your reasoning is already slipping from your grasp without you realizing it. The poison affecting your awareness with a wicked subtlety.

It terrifies you more than any other symptom ever could.

"He is right," Even Varric agrees with a sigh, throwing you an apologetic, sympathetic look. The friendly, respectful affection in his gaze, in the smile that quivers at the corner of his mouth, for how brief it is, says how much he too has grown fond of you.

That glance alone tugs at something in your chest that only a very close and selected group of people have been able to reach during the years.

The fact that the rouge dwarf - despite the hostility with which you treated him when you first met - has managed to sneak his way in and make himself at home there, shouldn't surprise you one bit.

His authentic, heartwarming, friendly concern and the contrasting feelings it triggers within you, at least distract you from the distress and grim taking over Evelyn's features behind that crinkle of concentration that forms between her eyebrows as she tears a long strip off one of the linens you use as temporary bandages and, with gentle but firmly methodic hands, wraps it around the base of the splintered shaft of the arrow poking out from your shoulder, applying pressure to help staunch up the blood pooled there.

It's a poor job to slow down the bleeding, not one worthy of her capabilities as a healer, but right now, in the middle of the desert, as a makeshift bandage to prevent sand and what else to stick to the wound, is better than nothing. Anything more permanent will have to wait until you find shelter.

"We don't have the necessary herbs and equipment to brew the antidote here," The Iron Bull points out.

Of course not, you think, in bitter amusement, frustrating resignation, and perhaps just a bit of worry, too.

Nothing in your path has ever been easy, so whyever should this be an exception?

"-but there are samples back at camp among the requisitions you have filled, boss."

Camp.

Right.

About an hour and a half of walking, mostly uphill, in between the sand dunes of the desert, under the unforgiving heat of the slowly setting sun and... with what looks like a sandstorm brewing at the horizon.

Just...

_Wonderful._

Still, annoyance pushed aside and intent on defying at all costs that crippling sense of inadequacy seizing at you more viciously than the poison no doubt already coursing through your veins, you move in an attempt to get up on your feet.

"Oh no, no, no, no, no. I don't think so, _Seeker Pentaghast._ " Evelyn states, her choice of title deliberate, to make you understand that she isn't up for some nonsense argument as she urges you back down, propping you up against the fortunate trunk of the tree where you took cover.

Begrudgingly (but having learned when it is best to not insist with her) you swallow the protest down, doing your best to not show how dizzy the simple motion has made you.

"We can't stay here," You say, going against the way your spinning head and churning stomach instantly rebel at the mere suggestion of having to get up. A sickening kind of vertigo that is vicious enough to make you regret your stubbornness to stand.

Still, "We are too exposed." You insist. "We would be an easy target for anyone who'd finds us; Venatori and desert's predators alike."

This is good.

Slotting back into the safeness and familiarity of your role as second in command. It's what you do best; coming up with a plan and folding into all the possible emergency escape routes when something goes wrong. And if you have learned anything (especially in the past several months) is that things have a way of going wrong more often than not.

Although, this time, since Evelyn isn't the injured one and technically your commander on the field aside for being the leader, she promptly steps into the role before your addled mind can clear up the thick fog clouding your thoughts enough for you to assemble a proper plan.

"We just passed that ancient dwarven tomb along the way."

"Yeah," Varric chimes in. "No vengeful wraiths, evil tomes, walking skeletons or tricky demons lurking around either." He snorts at the absurdity of the chance. "Might be the first not-infested tomb we have ever stumbled into, actually."

"That would do." The Iron Bull's voice thunders with approval. "It's cool and dry down there. Will help slowing down the effect of the poison while one of us gets back to camp to retrieve the necessary."

They converse between themselves as if you weren't even there, and apparently, reach a unanimous decision in a matter of seconds. Time is of the essence, you know, but you think you deserve to give your own opinion, even if you are going to be outvoted.

"Am I the only one who would rather not be quarantined inside a tomb? I am perfectly capable of going back to camp on my own-"

Trying to make a point of your not-so-serious conditions by gritting your teeth and struggling up to your feet in yet another attempt to stand, doesn't work much in your favor.

It happens all in a handful of seconds.

The brief burst of satisfaction that you get when, this time, you manage to stand on your own is promptly taken away the moment your vision swims.

The world tips upside-down and you sway dangerously.

"Cassandra!"

And if it wasn't for Evelyn jerking up and catching you, you would have tipped over. Your sense of balance lost underneath the sand slipping and giving away beneath your boots, leaving you scrambling to stay upright, as if gravity itself has decided to change its own rules with the sole intent to spite you.

You shut your eyes closed against the swirl of motion and groan at the resulting, sickening feeling expanding down in your stomach.

Even swallowing down the acrid mouthful of bile that rises in your throat takes far too much out of you.

" _Dammit Seeker_." You hear Varric mutter under his breath.

"Stubborn." The Iron Bull compliments out loud.

"B- _Bull-_ " Evelyn pleas, struggling to hold you up in full armor all on her own.

"Right. I got her, boss."

The next thing you know, the world temporarily tips off its own axis as you get hoisted up by a pair of insanely strong arms and- "What the-!"

The Iron Bull cradles you to his broad chest like a child and _ooohhh!_ The indignity of it all!

It blazes so brightly to sober you up enough to hotly threaten the Quinari through clenched teeth. "Put me down this instant, Tal-Vashoth!"

You are a warrior, not some... some _swooning_ damsel in distress from one of Varric's tales who needs to be picked up and carried! The insult is almost as scorching as the feeling gnawing its way from your wound and across your chest and prickling down you arm, tingling with a foreign warm numbness on your fingertips.

"My apologies, Seeker," The Iron Bull says, sounding not so much apologetic as he does amused though, giving the smirk quirking at the corner of his mouth. "Boss's order."

Oh, how it makes you _seethe._

You could insist (and are incredibly tempted to squirm your way out of his arms like a feral, wild feline) but knowing that you probably have as many chances at winning the argument as you have at standing on your own feet without collapsing with dizziness - least of all walk all the way back to camp - you regretfully decide to not fight it and risk making a complete jester out of yourself, sagely choosing to preserve that bit of dignity you have left, even if it means leaving your ego a bit bruised up as collateral.

Nothing and no one stops you though from mumbling protests for the entire, hurried walk back towards the sand-buried tomb you have passed ten minutes ago.

"Aw, come on Seeker," Varric chirps as he hurries along. From your current advantage point he looks... startingly small. "You could take advantage of the situation to admire the view from up there."

_Tsk._

Trust Varric Tethras to always find a way to distract you, if not from the burn of embarrassment of your current predicament, then from at least the pain that has started simmering down your arm and sizzling in an even more foreign and concerning manner within the cavity of your chest.

"Wait until we get back to Skyhold, dwarf." You hiss.

Leliana will have her own personal flag when you will upend him from the very top of the rookery. " _I_ 'll give you a _view_ to look at."

As if knowing exactly where your train of thought brought you, he barks a laugh, and there is something in it that has you realize that perhaps this kind of reaction was exactly what he was hoping to get from you in order to distract you.

"I'll hold you to that threat, Seeker." The warm note of affection in his voice makes you squirm. Not quite yet used to this development in your... ugh... _friendship_.

In response, you huff, but it comes out more like a puffed, breathy laugh rather than the growl of annoyance you are so used to aim at him whenever he and his jokes are involved.

The sound catches a bit in the back of your throat on the way out, so you interpret the cough that trips over your lips as a result to that, even if the burning spreading in your chest feels anything but natural.

A quick glance at your side to make sure that Evelyn hasn't caught sign of it unfortunately confirms what you dreaded most.

She noticed.

There simply isn't misinterpreting the way those soft blue eyes look at you with concern and more guilt that shouldn't be there in the first place, tainting the purity of the confident and loving essence that you see swimming in them before she diverts her gaze, looking resolutely forward with her jaw set and quickening her pace. Slipping into her own role of leading the party forward and watch out for dangers.

"Come on, people. Let's hurry."

**. . .**

  
By the time you reach the destination, there is no longer space for free interpretation about what is happening.

Whatever residue of doubt you have been hopelessly clinging onto has slipped from you along with your quickly fading sense of awareness.   
You can barely keep your eyes open, least of all mutter angrily under your breath. The back and forth of jokes with Varric for the sake of distraction are out of the question, worried as you are of opening your mouth only to risk having a whimper of pain slip past your lips, or a wheeze, or worse...

All you can do is stay quiet and shake and sweat with the effort it takes to swallow them down along with the raspy coughs that have started itching in your chest about half-way along the journey back to the ancient dwarven tomb.

It's concerning. How quickly the poison started acting.

So you have remained quiet and kept your eyes closed, to not worsen the sense of vertigo that has taken over your suddenly exhausted body, but also, to not see the worry etching deeper on Evelyn's features.

Your armor feels so unbearably heavy that you are left wondering, in the haze of a half-conscious and half-hallucinatory state (that might have something to do with how hot you are starting to feel... not something that you can totally attribute to the peak of heat in the middle of the desert before sundown), how can you endure carrying around its weight all day along with your mace. It's like being encased in a coffin made of leather straps and lead. Not practical at all.

"It was supposed to be a surprise, but I might already have handed the schematics to Harritt and Dagna to put together the best, lightest, arrow-proof and anti-venom, rune-enchanted piece of armor of all ages for you when we get back, darling." Evelyn says, making you realize that you might have voiced that comment about your armor out loud, which... damn it. You didn't mean to insinuate that you don't like it, because you _do_. She gifted you this one, also.

"Here we are," Bull announces, his deep, rumbly voice echoing all around the crypt as he dips down a low archway to enter the main chamber. "Tomb sweet tomb."

You muster enough strength to groan and roll your eyes at that one.

"As long as it's not going to be my final resting place, I'll take it."

"At least we won't be disturbing the inhabitants." Varric comments, still glancing warily around though, Bianca at the ready, as if waiting for a Shade to emerge from behind one of the pillars. (It wouldn't be the _first_ time, after all).

"Varric, Bull, knock it off with the commentary, please." Evelyn requests just as The Iron Bull carefully lays you down on what appears to be the smooth, leveled stone covering the main sarcophagus. _How charming_.

"And _you_ ," She says, fixing you with a narrowed glare as soon as you are at a more equal eye level. "Don't you dare faint or bleed out, or I swear on your Maker I will physically search every corner of the Fade until I find you only to murder you with my own hands." She threatens, and you honestly can't prevent your own lips from twitching into something that, under the scowl you have slipped on in order to mask the pain contorting your features, might actually resemble an honest smile.

It's not an idle threat.

You know she means it.

She has every tool at her disposal to make it happen. Right within her grasp. Like... _Literally_.

"That's... disturbingly romantic." You comment. A breathless rasp of a reply that is promptly followed by the fit of coughing you were so desperately avoiding to let loose and that is answered in stride with a commanding, hushing, terribly pained, "Shut up, you foolish, dashing, stubborn, noble hero."

_Dashing..._

Every adjective is laced with the same affection held in the soft kiss that she presses to your forehead. In each gesture as she presses a kerchief to your temples to dab the droplets of sweat that have gathered there.

The tenderness in it aches more than the wound ever could. Simmering more fiercely than the fire that has started itching in your lungs.

She slips her hand through your hair then, caressing it not so differently from how she usually does when you are spending an extremely rare morning in bed whenever you are in Skyhold; indulging in the lethargic warmth found between the furs and lifting into your room from the smithy furnace below, or coming from the hearth whenever you are in her private chambers. In the comfort and safeness that you find in each other's arms...

Not for the first time, the current circumstances fill you with guilt.

It's hardly the first time you find yourself inadequate to prevent someone you are supposed to watch over (...someone you love) to get hurt- one way or another.

The thought burns in your mind ten times more than the poisonous pain that has started simmering in your chest, growing hotter with each stuttering, erratic heartbeat and shaky, wheezing breath.

Even with the quickly increasing pulses of it slowly confining you within your own body and addling your mind however, you can still pick the worry churning inside her; it's in the slight tremor of her fingers as they skim through your hair. It is in the icy blue shade of worry that you notice her eyes have turned into when you dare to meet her gaze despite knowing what you would find into those usually warm, rippling pools.

She leans in and presses a soft kiss to your temple.

It tickles. In a rather familiar way that has not much to do with the contact itself but rather with the particular brand of energy that she emanates thanks to the Anchor.

You have grown used to feeling the magic sizzling all around her, constantly, and you think that's part of the reason why that touch and that kiss alone, for how innocent and chaste in all their infinite tenderness, seem to hold the power of a spell, dragging you back from the quickly approaching precipice of unconsciousness for a short moment - just long enough to render you aware of the way your heart flutters in response to the sentiment that she conveys with such a simple gesture.

You miss the closeness immediately and with a fierce intensity when she draws back, reaching for her satchel and sorting through its content.

Empty glass flasks clink together as she rummages around until she finds the one she was looking for.

"Here," She turns back to you but a moment later holding a vial containing a familiar greenish liquid. "Drink this."

Elfroot tonic.

A very strong brew too, given the smell.

Sharp enough to make your nostrils itch and your eyes sting as soon as the cork gets removed.

You have never been particularly fond of the stuff.

And Evelyn's personal recipe, for how incredibly effective, has a way to leave you particularly giddy, generally tingly, and more than a little drowsy. It might be why she has waited till now that you are lying down to make you drink it.

For once, you don't protest. You know better than to. Also, for how much it pains you to admit so, at the moment, the promise of some relief is far too great to be swapped for the risk of getting into a potential argument for which you are lacking the energy.

You almost reconsider the thought however as soon as you catch the frown on Evelyn's brow in the moment you accept the flask and drink from it without putting up the usual grumbling fight she is used to hear coming from you in similar situations involving (less fatal) injuries.

You are aware that it is a huge giveaway of the pain you are currently suffering. Now made even worse by the knowledge that you have added weight to her concerns. And guilt.

She doesn't say anything though. But there is this profound look of understanding in her eyes that says far too much-Everything. And what she doesn't utter with words, she conveys by brushing away the sweat-slick hair clinging to your forehead and pressing another kiss there.

The deliberately loud, awkward sound of a throat clearing redirects your attention back to the present and the other two occupants in the crypt.

"I... should make it back in a couple of hours at the longest." The Iron Bull informs, his deep, rumbly voice taking an apologetic and regretful tone as he tears you and Evelyn away from your private little moment.

"It would be less if I could borrow an Asaarash on the way back down, but-"

"I know." Evelyn interrupts, straightening up and slipping back into her Leader's persona; all tactics and rational thinking. "It's too steep of a ride for a mount. And I can't risk having you getting hurt, too."

Bull sighs dreamily.

"If only your stables were big enough to hold and train a winged pet dragon..." He says, shaking his head mournfully. "Oh, well. I better get going."

As soon as he turns around intent on taking his leave however, Evelyn stops him.

" _Bull..._ " She calls, and you can hear so many things in her voice.

A warning.

A plea.

The search of reassurance.

The trust and hope that she lays in his big, _big_ hands and...

And the heavy, unspoken implication of what would happen if he failed to keep his word.

All of that paired with a look that translates roughly into something along the lines of "I would really hate to leave the Charges orphans if you failed me."

In response, The Iron Bull, much to his credit, meets that silent, vulnerable plea disguised as a threat with a dismissive wave of his massive hand and a reassuring "Don't worry, boss. I got this."

And it is the firm confidence behind the casual words what seems to ease some tension from your lover's shoulders.

"I'll be back with the antidote before you know it." The former Ben-Hassrath promises. And given your own experiences with (loyal) spies, well... you are inclined to believe him.

Evelyn too, apparently.

She gives a short nod of assent and then the Iron Bull shifts his attention to you, pointing a stern finger.

"And you... You better not die before giving me a rematch."

A smirk tugs at the corner of your mouth. "Are you sure you want to face such humiliation for a second time?"

He barks a laugh.

"There! That's the spirit!"

The positivity that radiates off him is truly contagious, and for a moment you even forget about your predicament.

Too bad it doesn't last.

When the humor subsides, he and Evelyn share one final look filled with understanding, and with that, he turns and makes his way out of the dwarven tomb.

"Hang in there, Seeker." He calls reassuringly over his shoulder.

Your vision is swimming, making your head spin in a sickening way, but you still almost laugh again when he has to duck and squeeze his massively large and muscular body through the low archway at the entrance and twist his head in a rather comical way in order to pass and not get stuck by his enormous horns on the way out.

_...How did he even manage to carry you through such a narrow entrance?_

"All right... I guess this is the time we'll all find out how much Bull has grown fond of you by keeping track of how long it'll take him to come back with the antidote." Evelyn states, deciding (similarly to Varric's approach and taking in stride after The Iron Bull's lingering strands of humor) to fold into the safe shelter provided by a joke in order to not face the shadow of the doom-dense situation cramping within these cold chambers.

You appreciate it _immensely_.

"Yeah," Varric joins in, just as carefree. "I really hope you haven't done anything lately to upset him, Seeker." He says while Evelyn strokes back the hair from your sweaty forehead and winks down at you. "Like... throw him down on his ass in a sparring match in front of the Charges. Again."

That's _exactly_ what you have done so very recently though.

You hope that the smile twitching on your lips doesn't look like the pained grimace that you were trying to avoid showing.

Judging by the way Evelyn's features contort though, for how briefly, you know you haven't succeeded.

"I could take him down even like this," You state, with a bravado that you don't possess at the moment, in an attempt to reassure her that this isn't as bad as it actually is. Or getting worse by the minute.

You can't help but wonder for how much longer you'll be able to fight your own reactions, considering how everything is quickly becoming a struggle:

From keeping your eyes open without feeling nauseous with dizziness, to breathing without giving into the need to cough and get rid of the itchiness that seems to have nestled right behind your sternum.

There is one relief though, and given the amount of discomfort that the heat is bothering you with, it's not a small one.

"How do you like my cold hands now, darling?" Evelyn asks, a smug little note seeping in her voice when she hears you hum in contentment as soon as she lays one of her cool hands on your sweaty forehead.

The coolness sobers you up, shaking you from your half-conscious state and lending you enough clarity for you to open your eyes and attempt a far more convincing smirk up at her.

"You are cheating with magic." You accuse her, all while leaning in closer to the touch and the relief and comfort it brings.

The aid of magic isn't much, really. It's very subtle. So subtle, in fact, that you are surprised that your... abilities... can register it at all, especially considering your current conditions. But you can feel in that particular prickling on your skin the way she draws power from behind the Veil, even if it is just a tug to a thin thread of energy.

"There is no cheating about anything whenever you are involved, my love." She tells you, both sweet and teasing and light-hearted and so very affectionate all at once. The amount of emotions that she pours in those words is like a soothing balm.

But of course, that's just when the moment gets interrupted by the hot, stinging pain sparking from your pierced shoulder and sizzling and flaring all the way down your arm.

You manage to contain it all within a growl that, unfortunately, doesn't go unheard.

"It must be the venom kicking in," Varric mutters pensively. "...shit."

You blink back into focus, glancing up just in time to see Evelyn swallow thickly to center herself. Getting into panic will not be of any help, but you know how she looks like when she is chastising herself over something.

"The elfroot is going to take effect soon." She comments eventually, although it sounds like she is trying to reassure herself with the reminder, rather than comfort you.

"Meanwhile," She continues, clearing her throat in an attempt to disperse the shakiness that was about to take a hold on her voice, "We should get you out of your armor and take a look at the wound. Move you to a more comfortable position." She is already fussing around and gathering supplies, promptly ignoring your noises of disapproval at the idea of having to undo all the straps and remove all the layers of your heavy armor and, on top of all of that, also move to get more comfortable; a concept that, given the amount of tasks required, sounds like a paradox in itself.

"Don't worry," Evelyn says, as if reading your very thoughts, which, considering her perceptiveness, wouldn't be so surprising if she actually were. "I'll take care of it for you."

Your cheeks flare up with heat (with something unrelated to feverish warmth) upon hearing that. She does take a great deal of pleasure in undressing you, you have noticed.

Before you can decide whether to utter that observation outloud, you are stopped when the world around you decides to spin some more.

The blur of movement as Evelyn and Varric work in unison to dismantle the plates of the top of your armor, forces you to close your eyes, but finding yourself trapped into the darkness that suddenly surrounds you, you become increasingly more aware of the way your mind sways between awareness and unconsciousness. No matter how alluring and magnetic its pull is growing though, you still resist it with whatever energy you have left, willing your eyes to open once more.

Your vision adjusts to a smirking dwarf intent on unbuckling the straps keeping in place the pauldron on your uninjured shoulder.

"I'm impressed Seeker," He says in that joking tone of his; so terribly out of place in the dire circumstances, and yet, you have never appreciated it or his attempt at normalcy more than you do in this very moment.

And if someone can provide a distraction from a doom-dense situation, Varric would be the one. Although you almost regret thinking so highly of him when he points out that:

"You can't hold a mug of mead without starting to slur in your native language at the third sip, and yet here you are... poisoned with Wyvern's spit up to your ears and still conscious. Remarkable, truly."

Admiration and playfulness weave together in his voice in a way that only he is able to master so effortlessly.

In any other circumstance the flare of embarrassment caused by such remark would probably be enough to have you spring upright and chase him into whatever hole he would crawl into only to upend him upside down from Skyhold's bridge for making fun of your rather... limited... tolerance regarding alcoholic beverages. Right now though, you don't have it in you to suppress the startling bark of laughter that makes it past your very own, treacherous lips and bounces between the cold stone walls of the crypt.

Too bad that it comes out as an unexpected and unwelcomed rough series of dry, scrapy coughs that leaves you winded. Lungs and chest burning as if the oxygen trapped in there just got set on fire.

"Shit." He curses, dropping your vambrace, hurriedly reaching for his satchel and the canteen within, but Evelyn is quicker, and by the time Varric makes it back, she is already lifting your head and helping you take a few sips of water from hers.

Still, Varric shuffles tentatively closer (and you aren't even surprised by the way his presence fits rather than intruding in the intimacy of the moment) reaching out to rest his gloved hand on your bare forearm.

"Hang in there, Seeker." He says, and you actually feel, rather than hear in his voice, the urgency of that request in the squeeze of his hand.

A foreign tightness wraps around your throat at the gesture as you nod, trying to swallow and blink away the moisture gathering in your eyes (which may not be entirely related to the coughing fit).

Hawke is _so_ lucky to have him and his friendship.

You never had anything quite like it.

A friend willing to go through the threat of imprisonment and torture to protect you.

_And now..._

You glance back at Evelyn, standing on your other side, and your heart swells and breaks at the same time at the sight of the tentative, pained smile and contrasting, proud, fiercely burning affection rippling in the blue of her eyes, tainted by pain and a sickening grim worry you want nothing more than being able to chase away.

 _Now..._ You have found so much more. Unexpectedly, blessedly so.

You have lost enough.

You are not ready to lose this, too.

Words fail you on most days, when you are well and only impaired by your own cringe-worthy lack of eloquence, when pain and poison aren't coursing through your veins and corroding your insides with an acidic heat, but... in your brief, oh-so-new, romantic relationship, you have already developed a language that is all yours, and that maybe had already started to form before you could fully understand and grasp what was happening between the two of you.

So you don't have to hope that, when you reach out in between shivers to take her hand in yours and squeeze it as tightly as you can, she understands that you will cling for as long as you will be able to.

(And probably beyond that, too, given your stubborn nature).

"You are going to be all right." Evelyn promises. And the look that she gives you, the way she squeezes your hand back just as tightly yet mindful of your conditions, holds an understanding that couldn't have been translated with any word of any language known but the one that only the two of you speak without having to breathe a single vowel.

Still, she doesn't pass up the chance to tell you (probably because you may have let slip out how much you love the sound of her voice) and reassure you with a simple, nonetheless extremely comforting, "I'm right here, love."

And if those are going to be the last words you hear from her, it would be all right.

As it would be the sight of her smiling reassuringly, lovingly down at you.

So you let your eyes flutter shut before you can see the tears pooling in hers tumble down her cheeks when she blinks, allowing the rest of your body to surrender to the effect of the poison and the elfroot tonic battling against one another, while your consciousness gets dragged into another realm, waiting for the winner that will decide your fate.

  
**. . .**

  
"She is asleep," Evelyn Trevelyan sighs, some of the tension that had been weighing on her shoulders (if not the heaviness of apprehension and guilt settled in her chest) lifted by Cassandra's timely unconsciousness and her slow yet steady breathing.

"Yeah, I think it's best for what is to come next." Varric comments as if reading the Inquisitor's mind.

Evelyn swallows and nods. "Right," Her eyes drifting hesitantly to the broken arrow sticking out of her lover's shoulder.

There is the chain mail as well as a few more layers of clothes to peel away, and if that wasn't enough, poking at the wound without any kind of anesthetic would have been torture for someone even as headstrong as Cassandra.

She is about to change the strip of bandage that she had used to wrap around the base of the arrow and assess the area surrounding the exit wound when Varric chimes in.

"I don't think we should remove the arrow just yet, bluejay."

Evelyn would be lying if she said that the suggestion doesn't actually relieve her a little. She is not squeamish by any means, but the thought of ripping a fletched arrow from her lover's body... It makes her stomach twist on itself and her usually steady hands shake and sweat with uncertainty.

Still, what she has learned regarding injuries and the best way to treat them has the best on her impaired logic.

"The longer we keep it there, the higher the risk for-"

"I'm aware," Varric interrupts, but not unkindly. "But you also have to consider the fact that as soon as we remove it, she'll start bleeding again. _Profusely_. And the poison will affect her much faster."

Shit.

How hasn't she considered _that_?

"We can't leave it there indefinitely," She still protests, apprehension sinking its claws at her insides. Sharp and unforgiving.

"I'm not saying _indefinitely_ ," Varric says, his voice kind and attempting at sounding somewhat reassuring in a way that Evelyn appreciates, even if the effort is in vain.

"I'm suggesting we wait a bit longer. Give Bull time to be about halfway down from camp, and then we pull it out. Hopefully, when he'll arrive she won't have had to have been waiting for longer than half an hour for the antidote. Even less for it to take effect once she'll consume it."

It's... a valid argument. Albeit founded mostly on the hope that The Iron Bull will return within the established time.

For the moment, however, Evelyn is willing to believe that he will.

  
And if that means delaying the pain that Cassandra will suffer once the arrow will be removed, then she has already made her choice.

"Half an hour." She states firmly, leaving no space for further arguments.

Varric nods solemnly. "Not a minute longer." He swears, sparing a glance at the Seeker, lying powerless on the sarcophagus, then at the entrance of the tomb, listening outside to the wind hissing more loudly as it picks up speed.

"Hurry back, Horns." He mutters.

  
**. . .**

  
It's a needless fact to point out (you believe), not to mention a conclusion that you are pretty sure anyone who knows you would reach on their own without prompting, but usually, generally, for as far as you can remember, you have never had much tolerance for healers hovering over you whenever you were in need of one.

It had far less to do with magic and your wariness of it (especially when you were younger), and much more to do with all the fussing and pointless exaggeration of attention.

Eventually though, throughout the years, you found out that your general... antipathy... wasn't actually triggered by the annoyance of the ordeal in itself, but that such feeling was rather an uneasiness plucked from the realization that you never had someone care in such a way for you when you were much younger. Which, inevitably, would bring up the last person who did.

Anthony.

Scraped knees. Bugs bites. Hay fever (and resulting bruised, bloody knuckles and sprained wrist for punching a tree in retaliation at the suggestion). He took care of them all. In a way that your Uncle (despite being a mage and far more apt in taking care of this sort of things) couldn't do without making you feel so safe and cared for.

And then, your beloved big brother got murdered.

Leaving the biggest, ugliest, most brutal wound of all behind. Impossible to tend to. The kind that won't kill you despite bleeding all over itself for years. The kind that will keep on hurting even when it'd have scarred over.

_"Anthony..."_

Without conscious thought, you find yourself mouthing his name. And this time, you feel a hand cupping your jaw and the pad of a thumb stroking your hot, moist cheekbone in response. Instinctively, you lean into the familiarity of the refreshingly cool touch; strong and tender and loving all at once.

When you wake up, you have no recollection of any of this.

During your nap, someone has stripped you down to your undershirt, propped you up on something soft placed comfortably under your head and injured side, granting you a slightly elevated position that allows you to breathe more easily - And while the arrow is still there, poking from your shoulder like a stalagmite, the area around it has been cleaned and freshly bandaged, with as much care and method as possible given the impossibility of doing something more permanent and thorough just yet given all the factors revolving around the type of injury.

But of course, no matter the amount of thoughtfulness put into such care, it doesn't stop the pain, which makes itself known more intensely with every modicum of awareness that you regain.

You start to stir properly wake, taking inventory of how sore, hot and bothered your body feels - numb in some places - all while trying to extricate yourself from the vestiges of a feverish dream-hallucination you can't quite recall or piece together the reason for the uneasy, hollow feeling that it has left behind within you.

"Slept well, Princess?"

The title takes you more by surprise than the greeting in itself.

You blink your eyes properly open and that hollowness in your chest gets instantly filled up at the sight you are met with.

"Taking advantage of my current predicament to tease me, are you?" You ask when Evelyn's smirking face comes fully into view.

"Maybe I was just missing _terribly_ seeing that lovely scowl of yours, love."

You can't help it. The corners of your mouth twitch upwards right before a short huff of a laugh puffs from between your lips.

Evelyn grins, delighted.

Your heart thumps and soars at the sight.

"How are you feeling?" She asks then.

"Like I got pierced through by a poisoned arrow and laid down like a dying woman on a sarcophagus to wait for my demise."

"Sounds cozy," She quips. Grin quirking into one of those far more suggestive little sly smiles of hers.

You snort another laugh.

Maker... You _love_ her.

Cheekiness, innuendos and all.

"Think this thing is large enough to fit both of us?" She asks meaning the stone slab functioning as the lid of the sarcophagus. And the fact that she feels confident enough to flirt like this, wiggling her eyebrows like that, looking so unabashed...

You glance around and frown when you realize you are alone in the tomb.

"Where's Varric?"

"He went..." Evelyn hesitates for a moment, pensively, sucking her lips in as if to smother a smile. "He went _writing_ his autograph on the sand."

She smirks again then, for some reason, while your frown deepens.

There is a particular _tilt_ to that smile that suggests you must be missing _something_ in your haze of semi-consciousness, but decide not to press further. 

_It must be a writer-metaphor or something just as poetic and deep,_ you reason. You're _sure._

Regarding her previous question, however, even though you are currently alone...

"I'm not sure if this is the right place to play healer-and-patient, darling." You tease her, enjoying immensely the wide-eyed, mouth-gaping look that the suggestion elicits. She clearly wasn't expecting _that_. And honestly, the reaction is warranted, given that you usually aren't so... blunt, or inclined to these kinds of propositions. (They are more _her_ thing). "However," You offer. "You are welcome to hold my hand."

Strangely enough, the compromise earns you a squinty-frowny quirk of a puzzled smile.

"I already am." She states.

And now it's your turn to squint in confusion.

"What?"

The air around you feels suddenly thicker.

Dense with that same something invisible and just as worrisome that has been lurking in the shadows ever since you got struck by the arrow.

The layer of amusement that Evelyn had managed to slip on her face in order to mask her concerns and guilt and fears, slips off in an instant, replaced by a look far more unsettling and grim.

"Cassandra, can't you feel this?"

There is... a _squeeze,_ you think. But you can only tell so by the pressure rather than the physical contact itself against your skin.

"I'm... I'm not sure," You admit as a whole new sense of dread claws at your insides.

"Can you move your fingers for me?" The request may sound clinical, but Evelyn's voice quivers with a crippling anxiety.

Throughout your adventures (and aside to what happened at the Temple of Sacred Ashes) there haven't been many instances that have set you into something resembling true panic. But there is a first time for everything, as Varric says, and you imagine that the chill of distress that spreads inside you and takes such a hold of your rationality, might as well resemble panic when you find out that you can hardly flex your own hand and barely acknowledge the movement at all.

A struggle (and resulting concern) that must be fairly visible, given the gasp that slips past Evelyn's lips.

And the effort it takes you to keep that panic contained enough to even speak, is awfully disarming.

"What does it means? What is going on?"

You'll admit, that despite having the training to know how to respond in some possible life-threatening situations, your knowledge is limited to a few, crucial points. None of which gives you a clue regarding what might be happening to you, besides far too many fleeting suspicions.

Luckily, Evelyn has spent quite some time learning the theory and practice of magical healing, and ever since you found Skyhold, she has spent a great deal of whatever little free time she has, perusing the vast, fully stocked library there. Deepening her previously basic knowledge into human anatomy and physiology to match the one of a surgeon's apprentice.

"The arrow must be pressing down on a major nerve, cutting off your sensibility," She explains, and even though her voice has regained that controlled firmness, her hands, you notice, shake visibly when she shifts her attention to the wound, unwrapping the bandage from the base of where the arrow pokes out of your flesh, right below the dip at your collarbone, and examining more attentively the location of the injury as if comparing it to some modern illustration of anatomy found in one of those books she has been studying.

"What does it mean exactly?" You repeat, becoming increasingly aware of the way your heart has picked up the pace, rabbit-quick, hammering in your ears, your entire chest constricted with the uncomfortable, unfamiliar swell of anxiety. Because you may not be a healer, but a part of you does already _know_ what that could mean.

"It means that you could lose sensibility to your hand." Evelyn states, blinking blearily, eyes out of focus and shaded over. And the pause that follows as she swallows thickly in an attempt to steady her voice and get her emotions under control, is just long enough to heighten the sense of dread pooling in your gut. "Possibly your arm."

"I thought we agreed that we couldn't remove the arrow just yet." Varric emerges from the entrance, blown in by the wind hissing outside, wiping sand from his leather jacket. His expression pitched in a whole new level of concern you don't think you have ever witnessed upon his features before.

"We have to. She's losing sensibility, Varric." Evelyn explains hurriedly, eyes drifting to the satchel containing the essentials to deal with injuries on the field. You can see the wheels turning frantically in her head, already planning how to go on about this, no doubt. "As long as we keep it there, it will keep on bleeding. And don't let me start on the risk of infection again..."

"You are glowing with positivity." You tell her sarcastically.

Her response is cut off by Varric and the unsettling information he shares.

"You don't understand, there is a storm coming, Inquisitor. A _sandstorm_."

Evelyn startles.

And damn it all, you do too.

It was real then.

You remember the clouds from earlier, gathering at the horizon. But you had _hoped..._

"Bull may delay his return." Varric finishes, a helpless, crestfallen look on his face.

You don't dare to look at Evelyn. Afraid of what you would find on her face if you do. Choosing to push past the pain and panic instead with gritted teeth.

"I don't _care_ if he isn't going to make it in time." You hiss. "I can't wait and see if he will. And I want you to take this thing off me. Right. _Now_."

When Evelyn doesn't protest and Varric doesn't dare to object either, you know it's because they too do know it's the best course of action.

Still, it doesn't stop the regret from showing on your lover's pained features, even though this was an inevitable step to take sooner or later.

"I'm so sorry, love."

You blink at her and shake your head, dismissing the (totally unnecessary) apology.

"It's all right." You tell her, releasing a long, shaky breath through your nose. "I need you to do it."

You are a warrior first and foremost, but while the possibility of never being able to properly hold your sword again is deeply, profoundly unsettling, the thought of not being able to register her touch, to graze the soft skin of her cheek and _feel it_ under your fingertips... It simply terrifies you.

"I _want_ you to do it." You repeat, squashing your worries and smothering that swelling sense of dread like you would any other enemy; without mercy.

You are not alone in your concern. There is a great amount of fear floating among the blue of Evelyn's eyes, but she defies it by swallowing it down with a dry gulp and nodding with conviction.

"Varric..." She calls, never diverting her gaze from your tired, exhausted, pained one.

"Right here, Inquisitor." The dwarf reports at once, approaching your other side, already maneuvering to help you lift up your torso and using your own rolled-up leather doublet to keep you propped up on your uninjured side.

"I'll pour some elfroot directly on the wound," Evelyn narrates as she undoes the temporary bandages wrapped around your wounded shoulder. "It will numb the pain a bit but not much."

"It's fine." You reassure her, well accustomed to how it works. "Do what you have to. Just..." You pause, smothering another twinge of pain with a harsh gulp, "Get this thing off me, please."

Evelyn nods, that same unnecessary apology in her eyes for what is about to come.

She moves into position, but before she can do anything, Varric stops her.

"Wait!" He demands with urgency in his voice and the spark of an idea twinkling in his eyes.

"Here," There are some shuffling noises as he pats and searches for something in the inner pocket of his leather jacket, pulling out a slightly dented metal flask and handing it over to Evelyn, who takes it, examines it, takes off the cap, sniffs it, and then eyes him sideways, one eyebrow cocked, half-puzzled and half-incredulous.

" _Seriously,_ Varric?"

"What?" The dwarf defends with a shrug before you can ask the question yourself. "I would have shared it tonight at camp around the fire as a nightcap after dinner, but I just realized it would prove far more useful now."

Evelyn considers, nods in approval, and then looks down at your frowning face.

"Here's to that." She mumbles and, without preamble or warning (for which you are secretly thankful for the lack of) she pours a sharp-smelling, amber-colored liquid on your wound.

"Maker's breath!" You wheeze, eyes stinging with sudden tears, skin flushing with heat all over. "What in the Void is that _stuff?!_ "

You aren't quite prepared for the way it burns all the way into your very bone marrow. As if the venom in your system wasn't already contributing to making you feel like you had been lit on a pyre.

"Dwarven whiskey." Varric chirps joyously.

The bloody sadist.

"It burns like acid!" You hiss.

"Well, you are welcome. Thing's great for two things: get you drunk off your ass in two sips and, lucky for you Seeker, sterilize wounds." _And burning half of your insides along with it,_ you want to add.

"Lucky for me." You repeat instead through gritted teeth, glaring at the sympathetic, apologetic, half-smile that he plasters on his face.

If there is one positive side of this little ambush, is that it has surely rendered you a bit more alert, but hoping that the effect will last a bit longer, or that the alcohol will burn away the poison coursing through your veins, is nothing but wishful thinking.

The elfroot draught follows next, and the numbing effect takes little to seep in, soothing any lingering sting soon enough.

"Ready?" Evelyn asks.

 _As ready and thrilled as one could ever be at the prospect of having an arrow yanked out of their body,_ you think, but bite on your tongue and give a sharp, curt nod of assent, resolutely deciding to keep your lips pressed tightly together, concerned of what kind of blasphemy could escape were you to allow your mouth to fall open in a scream.

Varric holds you still on your side while Evelyn gets a grip above the fletching of the half of the arrow shaft sticking out your back.

You screw your eyes shut in preparation of the inevitable, but there is nothing that could ever prepare anyone for what is to come next.

The snap of the second half of the arrow reverberates within your own chest. But, somehow, you manage not to scream.

The only thing you are grateful for is that Evelyn doesn't pause, doesn't stop in her ministration to let you take in a breath to steady yourself. Instead, without wasting a moment, she focuses all her efforts and mana to rip the remaining stick embedded in your shoulder in the fastest and most efficient way possible - if not the less painful.

With a surge of magic and an equally invisible pull, the broken arrow tears from your flesh like the cry that you can't contain and gets ripped from your throat, flinging forward until it lodges itself between one of the cracks marring the etched stone wall of the crypt, dripping with your blood.

You have had to go through the sickeningly unpleasant ordeal of having to remove an arrow from your own body before. You have a couple of scars to prove so. But just because you have been through the experience more than once, it doesn't mean you have grown accustomed to the feeling of something foreign being torn from your body and feeling your muscles and flesh cling onto it for all the way out.

The pain sobers you up and exhausts you all at once, rendering you far too alert and leaving you sick with dizziness at the same time. Your vision blurs, but luckily, you manage not to pass out, using whatever energy you have to stifle the rest of your screams and swallow them down one by one, huffing hotly and shakily through your nose as you recover.

When it's done and you are laid back down on the hard cold stone slab, you are somehow more mortified to discover that a few tears have leaked and made it down the side of your face, rather than feeling worried about the way your body shakes and seems to grow hotter by the second.

Distantly, under the frantic beats of your heart thundering in your head, you hear Varric and Evelyn converse and fuss over you, checking the wound more accurately for possible splinters and, mercifully, finding none. Some more of that acidic stuff is poured over the newly open, gaping wounds, but this time you barely register the scalding burn that it leaves in its wake. Because a second later Evelyn's hands press against your entry and exit wound with a set of fresh, clean bandages and the softness and firm gentleness of her palms - one on your back, the other right underneath your collarbone - is enough to soothe the nerves that have been set aflame by the recent procedure.

Your Seeker senses register the tingle of magic as she pulls at a thread from the Fade before you even hear her murmuring a minor healing spell; it won't close the wounds on its own, but it helps a little to slow down the bleeding and subside the throbbing pain into something slightly more manageable.

"I'm not sure I should have done that," You hear Evelyn murmur afterward when she is securing into place the bandages with a wrap around your torso, "But I couldn't risk having you bleeding out."

"Trust you..." It's all you manage to utter, voice raw and breathing harsh as you struggle to recover from the whole ordeal.

Varric assists her until the wound has been properly dressed again before deciding to give you a moment of privacy.

"I think that I'll... _uh_... go check the perimeter with Bianca or something," He awkwardly suggests, shrugging back into his jacket and picking up his beloved crossbow. "Just... Holler if you need anything. The echo here carries out spectacularly, I'm sure."

"Try not to get too far away Varric," Evelyn warns. "Can't have you getting buried under the sand too along with your local ancestors."

"Don't worry boss." He assures, pulling a hood over his head. "I'll make it back before running into the risk of being swept all the way to the Anderfels."

With that, he turns and leaves.

The echo of his retreating boots has just faded when Evelyn turns to you and, anxiously, inquires "How are you feeling?"

There are so many ways you could answer that. And none of those answers would be reassuring in any way or make the circumstances appear any less dire than they are.

Unwilling to lie to her though, you utter a truth that is far less frightening than if you were to tell her (in all sincerity) about your current, utterly _miserable_ state.

"I'm not sure if I'll be able to stay awake for much longer." You confess, already feeling yourself swaying towards the far-too-tempting bliss of unconsciousness.

"It's all right." Evelyn assures. "I _need_ you to rest." Her hand slips into yours, interlocking your fingers and squeezing, hard enough for you to feel the pressure of it this time, and with it the affection in it, the comforting, unspoken _"I'm here"_. And the relief that fills you up at the simplicity of the regained sensibility makes you feel so much less frightened at the idea of closing your eyes.

You gaze up at her, but almost regret it when you see the tears pooling into her blue eyes - yet so bravely held back for your sake. Such a mismatch with the hardness that you find in them and see mirrored in the firm set of her jaw.

"I'll be right here when you wake up," She promises, and even though her voice is surprisingly, comfortingly soft, you can spot and recognize the threat hiding behind that look. Something that in your head sounds so much like the threat she made to you earlier. That, _"Don't you dare let go, or I'll search the Fade all the way to the Black City to find you and drag you back to face my wrath."_

The thought, the reminder, the poetic _romanticism_ of the image that it conjures, elicits another, gentler, yet fiercer kind of warmth that stokes the sparks of affection fluttering in your chest.

Words swim in your head, but trying to catch them and put them into any resemblance of order and _then_ , above all of _that_ , find a way to push them past your lips, seems like an unfathomable amount of work. So you simply choose to answer that request, that silent plea, by summoning some of the strength seeping out of your body, and squeezing her hand back. As hard as you are able. To ensure that she gets the message.

If the smile that you see curling on her lips is anything to go by, then you succeeded.

At last, you give in to the heaviness of your eyelids, allowing them to flutter shut, casting the world away.

When you fall asleep, Evelyn's hand is still grasping yours.

Her lips press lightly against the corner of your mouth.

In the Fade, you taste the salt of her tears.

  
**. . .**

  
_"How long has it been?"_ A soft, elegant, feminine voice brimming with trepidation asks.

 _"I'm afraid we are past our time mark, Inquisitor."_ A masculine, rough sigh filled with regret answers.

_"It's the storm, isn't it? He could have gotten turned around without realizing it."_

_"The slope of the downhill will keep him on track."_ The same rough voice offers. Quiet, reassuring words. _"He'll come back with the antidote. Don't doubt that for a moment, bluejay."_

 _"I'm not."_ There is a heavy pause, a shuffling noise, the slosh of water, and then, the blissful feeling of a cool and damp cloth resting on your sweaty hot forehead. _"But I must deal with the consequences of this delay. One way or another."_

_"Whatever you are thinking, bluejay... Let's go for the less dangerous options first, shall we? Get Horns some more time to get back. Who knows. He might be right on his way."_

The pause and heavy, shaky sigh that breaks it, sound like assent.

  
**. . .**

  
Something wet and cool touches your lips.

It tastes green on your tongue, surprisingly warm, delicately balsamic. A slightly bitter and somehow familiar aftertaste hiding behind the resinous sweetness sticking to your palate, but the moisture brings such relief to the dryness in your throat that you find yourself swallowing it down with unconscious greediness.

 _"Slowly, slowly,"_ The voice instructs, and the tone, the familiarity of the gentle command, compels you to obey.

_"There. That's it. Good girl."_

Afterwards, as you get gently laid down, a pair of soft lips press briefly against your brow.

_"She is still too warm. That was my last restoring potion, and even if I had ten more she's already had too much. I couldn't make her take another single sip in her conditions without risking her going into shock."_

A flask clinking against stone and echoing with its emptiness follows the string of information.

_"So what do you suggest?"_

A short, pensive pause. A long exhale.

_"Luckily, I have a few more vials of lyrium."_

_"I... didn't know Seekers could draw healing benefits from drinking ly-"_

_"They are not for her."_

The silence stretches until it curls on itself and morphs into understanding.

"Right. I see. And how much will they aid you, exactly?"

The voices grow less distant, far more tangible. Poking at the flimsy veil of your consciousness.

"Unfortunately, they aren't very potent, but hopefully... they'll dampen the fatigue for as long as it will take for Bull to find his way back."

"Time to finally put Chuckles's ancient healing teachings to use, I wager? Wait... You can't actually _cure_ her though... right? So how is this going to work?"

"I'll focus on her vitals; slow down her breathing and heartbeat to a minimum, keep her unconscious to lower stress response. It will ensure that the poison won't spread further than it already has."

"It almost sounds like... _ah_... How do you mages call it? A stasis?"

"Basically, yes. It is. Although... keeping the spell is going to be considerably taxing on my mana."

"Say no more. I'll keep the flasks coming."

There is a replying, lukewarm chuckle. Some shuffling around. And then a resolute silence followed by a firm "I'm ready" coming right from above you.

Barely a moment later there is a buzz of energy.

One that even in your semi-conscious state (thanks to the abilities that the Seekers have gifted you with) you can recognize by the tingling-like feeling prickling at your own skin and making the hairs on the back of your neck rise with static energy as the power of the Fade gets drawn and channeled into this dimension.

It's the last thing your senses register before a warm sort of numbness claims you along with any trace of pain, urging you back into the depth of a blissful and more restful unconsciousness.

  
**. . .**

  
_"Only one left, I'm afraid."_

_"Remind me again why I didn't think to bring more along?"_

_"Because we were out scouting, bluejay, and got ambushed. And none of this is your fault."_

_"I appreciate the sentiment Varric, I do. But I should know better by now to expect enemies around every corner and prepare accordingly for any and all situations we might find ourselves into."_

_"Look... Bull is going to come back with the antidote. And the Seeker is going to pull through."_

_"That is not under discussion. I won't allow her to die. I simply won't."_

_"You really are made for each other. A stubbornness to match your mutual penchant for heroic acts."_

_"Alright, alright... before you start drafting your next novel pass me over the last flask, please."_

  
**. . .**

  
You are stirred awake by the first needling of pain poking at your consciousness.

It's subtle at first.

A prickling sizzle of warmth.

But it doesn't take long for that feeling to burn completely the numbing effect of the elfroot concoction and coursing through your veins like a wicked swirl of acid and lava combined.

The pain grows more acute and your breathing, consequently, considerably more erratic.

A few whimpers slip in between. Quiet, but apparently loud enough to draw the attention of the voices.

_"What's happening?"_

_"She's waking up..."_

Consciousness slips from your weak grasp.

Opening your eyes seems like an impossible task.

But listening requires no effort from your overextended, injured body, which seems to shake a bit more alert at the sound of Evelyn's voice.

So smooth and melodic and... resolute... despite the unmistakable tiredness laced into it.

_"Cassandra,"_

Maker... 

The way your name rolls off her tongue and falls from her lips...

"Cassandra? Love?"

The quiet urgency in her voice stirs you awake, but the sweetness of her tone gets corrupted once you grow more alert and the pain, so much more intense and consuming, has you struggling in order to contain the resulting, embarrassing whimpers trying to crawl their way up from your parched throat.

You don't dare blink your eyes open, but when you try to speak instead, the dryness in your mouth doesn't allow your voice passage.

The quick, almost instant relief of water wetting your lips and sliding down your throat isn't as comforting as you thought it would be, and when - despite being adequately propped up - you choke on a sip, the fit of coughing that gets elicited leaves you winded.

Your entire body caught in hot shivers. Unable to tell if you are freezing or going up in flames.

It simply _burns_.

Everything.

 _Everywhere_.

Your skin.

The air in your lungs.

The blood in your veins.

The disarranged, chaotic, feverish, loud thoughts in your head that barely make it possible for you to hear the conversation going on around you, echoing between the stone of the tomb you are quite sure is going to be your final resting place.

"Shouldn't we consider other options? Like any other options but this one?"

"Don't you think I would if I could?"

_Evelyn._

She sounds... pained and torn and angry like you never heard her.

But just as fiercely resolute.

The kind of determination that you know is bound to trouble.

That particular tone of conviction that is one of the traits defining her character that you admire most in her. No matter how close to madness her stubbornness tends to drive you.

Occasionally.

(So very often).

"Inquisitor- Evelyn, _please,_ you can't be seriously taking in consideration-"

"Bull hasn't returned yet, and I have every intention to keep going until he returns with-" The rant is interrupted by a grunt, some stumbling noises, the heavy breathing of exertion laced with what you easily recognize as frustration to one's limits.

"Hey, hey. Take it easy there," Never you would have thought to be grateful to have Varric nearby in your current predicament. Never you would have thought him trustworthy enough to feel comfortable knowing he would be there to take care of someone if you weren't there or in the conditions to do it so yourself.

_How things have changed..._

"The Seeker won't do any better if you wear yourself thin and faint with exhaustion."

"I'm fine." Evelyn protests through gritted teeth, pushing past obvious strain, stubborn as ever. A mirror of your own ego, this woman.

"And I appreciate your concern, Varric. But you know I'm not going to stop. Not even if I have run out of lyrium."

Wait.

"There is only one option left for me now."

_What?_

"Come on. There must be _another way_." You don't believe you have ever heard Varric sounding as worried and as genuinely caring as you have only, occasionally, (over)heard him when talking to-

"Isn't this what Hawke has done?" Evelyn interject, almost accusingly. An odd fierceness lining her words despite the exhaustion weighing in her voice. "To keep her lover from being dragged away by the Quinari?"

Suddenly, a thread of confusion wraps itself around whatever trace of consciousness you had regained with whatever kind of effort she is putting to ward off the pain from your injured, overextended body.

Does she means... _The Champion fighting the Arishok in a duel to the death? How does that apply here?_

Maker... The venom must be affecting your mind more strongly than you were afraid it would. Your thoughts swim confusingly, chasing and tangling around each other into knots. And not one of them makes sense. At this point, it's quite possible that you might be suffering a hallucinatory dream.

In the dream, Varric sighs.

"Cassandra, she... _Well..._ " He hesitates. "She doesn't exactly know the _full_ version of the story- the _uncensored version_ I shared with you."

So much greater is the curiosity that it completely eats away the simmer of old anger that rises anew upon hearing that he has yet kept something from you regarding Hawke. Again.

"But yeah..." The lying, conniving dwarf continues. "Hawke did go through such... methods... that one time."

Maker!

_What in the Void are they going on about?! What has the Champion done when fighting the Arishok that Varric has yet denied to tell you?_

If only just breathing wasn't already taking up much of your energy, you would pull yourself up and hang him upside down a tree, demanding answers by threatening him with a spiked mace.

"You are not going to stop me though, are you?" Evelyn's question cuts through your fantasy revenge with a tone that is surprisingly sharp under that initial, deceiving softness of playfulness. The thread of surprise laced in the inquiry does nothing to hide that slight tremor of nervousness. So feeble that you could almost convince yourself you must have misheard it.

Varric chuckles, but the sound, usually so buoyant and lively, now rings so terribly hollow. It twists something awful inside you. Something that stirs even more the frustration that you are experiencing for not being able to understand what they are discussing that might be so...

"I've seen people do some crazy, terrible shit for love." The dwarf confesses. "Wheather it was to save your beloved pirate wench after she lied to you for years or..." He pauses, sighing thoughtfully. "...try to restore an ancient mirror with the hope that it would help your people regain even a fragment of their long lost culture."

That rings another bell in your mind.

And within the context, it sounds an awful lot like a warning.

Something that should have you spring upright in alarm.

Right now though, the only memories that manage to find their way through the thick fog clouding your mind, are disassembled pieces about a Dalish elf living in the Alienage in Kirkwall. A... magic mirror, maybe? And... And... something very, _very_ important that slips further from your grasp the harder you try to take a hold of it.

Exhaustion forces you to stop chasing that slippery thought, but it is with extreme reluctance you do so. Your focus redirecting and adjusting to the long silence that the rest of the surrounding world has fallen into. You can still feel, however, the heavily charged, mutual understanding that passes between the two of them, even if you can't understand it yourself.

But such confusion is still nothing compared to when you hear Evelyn release a shuddering breath and say, with a tears-strained voice that despite its raspiness doesn't fail to convey the profound sense of gratefulness, "Thank you, Varric."

The urge to understand, to ask, to know and demand what is happening flares anew inside you with a vengeance.

Tired of being left in the dark, urged by that warning that keeps on ringing urgently in your head, you summon whatever strength you have left in your body, willing your eyes to open, even if just by a slit.

It's all a blur.

A drunken haze of shadows and weak shafts of light dancing all around.

Try to figure out the shapes surrounding you only makes your head hurt and swim far worse, but for that brief moment you manage to keep them open, you are able to distinguish two familiar figures.

Evelyn's tall one standing next to Varric's shorter and slightly bulkier shape.

"Don't mention it, bluejay." The dwarven figure says. "Like, really. Don't breathe a word about this."

Maker knows if your voice will even aid you, but you still put your last efforts to try and form words.

"W-w... _wh-at_...."

You barely manage the weakest, most pitiful croak, and yet, it is enough to make both Evelyn and Varric snap their attention down at you.

Barely an instant later, your body gets engulfed by a cool, buzzing energy that numbs your senses and tempts your consciousness with the same inviting offer of sleep from before.

Only this time, you fight it with every ounce of stubbornness that you possess. But it's to no avail.

"Please forgive me, love."

As confusing and worrying as hearing Evelyn say something like that is, your need to stay awake and ask what is going on can't stand a chance against the energy forcing your body into submission.

Your slow, steady breathing is no longer under your control.

The most terrifying thing of all however, is that you are still mostly conscious. 

More than enough to hear the conversation that picks up but a few moments later.

"Do you.... ah... need anything?"

"Just... one of your daggers. And for you to stay close by and be on your guard in case... something slips through." Evelyn trails off, heavy with an implication that you should catch but that, at the moment, eludes you completely, even with the note of dread tainting her usually smooth, suave and elegant voice.

"Try not to let that happen." Varric answers, and the understanding in his voice only has you further infuriated with yourself and your current helplessness.

"I would hate to find out what kind of brutal, forgotten torture the Seeker would reserve for me if she knew I let you do this."

"But you are still letting me," Evelyn points out. "Regardless of the consequences."

There is a pause in which in can practically hear Varric's hesitation. It grows thick enough to be almost palpable.

"Well... Let's just say that there are two friends for whom I would go through the threat of horrific torture now." The smile in his voice is what makes such statement all the more puzzling to you.

"Also," The dwarf continues, sounding somehow more hesitant and... absurdly abashed. (You really must be losing your mind). "I'm smart enough to not get in between the strength of your affection for her."

You might not be able to do anything - actively speaking - but hearing those words surely sets the muscle contained within your chest into a brief, yet powerful fluttery-frenzy that almost has you forget about all that happened.

At least until you hear the wet laugh filled with pain and regret that slips past your lover's lips.

Then, your heart (and a part of your very soul) cracks open upon hearing what she says.

"I believe that after this, if we both make it through, she'll want nothing to do with me anymore..."

_What?_

"She is never going to forgive me for this."

Maker's breath...

_What kind of nonsense is she blathering about?_

As if you...

As if _she_ could _ever_ do something- _anything_ to erase the depths of your affections for her.

Enough of this.

You take advantage of the shock of alarm triggered by those words and using it as momentum to summon whatever scrap of strength is left in you, channeling your Seeker senses to fight off her magic.

The effort required is enormous.

It makes you sick with nausea.

And you barely manage to make her spell wobble at best for no more than a handful of seconds, but you do your best and use them to try to sit up and speak.

"E-Evelyn..." You stutter, voice rough, croaky and painfully strained, but even just uttering her name, tasting its sweetness among the bitterness of the poison coursing through your body, brings an unexpected comfort.

You don't manage to say anything else though, or move by another inch that a pair of soft, gentle hands promptly urge you back down. The strength of the spell increasing tenfolds and shattering whatever resistance to it you had miraculously managed to summon.

There is no wrestling of wills, weak as your mind is growing there is no match, but your highly-trained body must still find a way to protest and resist, until you hear her sweetly soothing voice again.

"Hush, love," Warm fingers trace lovingly the side of your face in a lingering, feather-light caress. "Rest."

And hearing that plea disguised as a command only serves to increase that thing... that suspicion that only now has grown big enough for you to be able to recognize it for what it truly is.

It strikes you all at once.

As sharp as the arrow that has pierced so easily through your armor.

It hurts a thousand times worse.

If the tone of her voice wasn't enough to make your heart tremble with trepidation and swell with a sickening sort of anxiety, the quivering, heartbroken kiss that she plants on your forehead threatens to cleave it in half.

There is a slicing sound.

A muffled whimper.

Then a tingle.

It escalates into a strong, violent quake that has nothing to do with the subtle, gentle buzz that you have grown accustomed to feel and easily recognize as her signature release of mana.

It's shortly followed by a surge of the most powerful, overwhelming kind of magic. 

And as it engulfs you, you finally understand.

You recognize that dark, twisted swirl of raw power for what it is.

No.

_No._

No, no, no, _no!_

But panic doesn't have the chance to sink its venomous claws further, that your awareness gets severed in the most brutal and abrupt way from the physical world. Slamming you down somewhere deep and frighteningly dark where there is nothing and nowhere to grasp for.

No softly muttering voices.

No occasional whispers of touches or other quietly muted sensations.

No fleeting bits of briefly regained consciousness like before.

Just an inescapable, terrifying, icy cold of nothingness.

  
**. . .**

  
You don't know how long it passes before you regain awareness. Before you adjust within your body until it feels like your own again.

In all honesty, you weren't expecting to.

The horrid sensation of plummeting into that cold abyss of darkness is still clinging to you, like the tendrils of a chilling nightmare, even as you shake off the vestiges of sleep, although... you don't exactly remember how it all came to be.

The drowsy kind of heaviness and exhaustion that seems to be burrowed in your bones makes it even harder.

That's it, until a muted pang of pain located half-way between your chest and your shoulder, reminds it for you in the moment you try to roll over.

The hiss of breath that the movement causes also makes you aware of the slight itch nestled behind your sternum.

Yet another clue to help you in assembling the pieces of what feels like a frantic, feverish dream. But the most important detail stand out with surprising clarity:

An ambush.

An archer emerging out of nowhere and aiming for the Inquisitor.

You refusing to let anything happen to her.

The arrow.

The venom.

The _pain._

The desperation in Evelyn's eyes as she watched you helplessly while you suffered for hours, waiting for Bull and the antidote until she couldn't take it anymore and she decided to-

It rushes all to you at once. Memories and feelings both. And with the same unforgiving, devastating force of a tidal wave.

The impact of sensations makes you gasp, leaving you winded, but you still spring upright, clutching at your shoulder and cursing under your breath at the stab of pain that the abrupt movement causes.

It doesn't stop you from trying to stand up.

But the short, blurry, shadowy figure that comes rushing from your peripheral does.

"Hey, easy there, Seeker."

You almost startle at the echo, turning on your side to be met with Varric.

If a look could incinerate something... He would be a smoking pile of ashes as soon as you recollect what he has allowed Evelyn to do.

"Take it slow," He says, yet unaware of the murder flashing in your eyes. "You shouldn't be up already, the antidote has only just started to-"

He stops in his tracks as soon as he glances up at you and locks his amber gaze with yours. The eye contact is enough to have him squirming uneasily under the blazing fire he finds reflected there; a guilty reaction that erases any doubt you might have had, and confirms that those memories you have aren't simply disjointed snaps of dreams or fever-induced hallucinations.

It really happened.

All of it.

To his credit, he understands immediately the reason why he finds himself at the end of such a murderous glare and doesn't try to deceive you like he has done far too many times already.

And while you would like nothing more than to strap him to a chair and demand "how could you let her do it", the interrogation and possible torture will have to wait. You have other priorities.

So you stand, slowly, clutching at your bandaged shoulder and, towering over him, you demand to know the most important thing of all.

" _Where_ is she?"


	2. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm glad I didn't post this right away along with the first chapter like I originally intended to, since this way I got to re-read it and change/correct a few things. Nothing major, but I like it better now.  
> Anyway, here it is, the epilogue of the story.
> 
> Enjoy

The storm has come and gone all while you were... incapacitated. But you can still hear the wind howling softly with its memory all around as soon as you step out of the crypt.

The entire region living up to the descriptive name that it has been dubbed with so very appropriately.

Grains of sand roll and flutter above the packed dunes stretching endlessly before you, creating miniature vortexes and giving the wind itself a form of its own for a few seconds before depositing down on the ground and repeating the motions over and over again in an unchoreographed dance of elements.

There isn't much light to suggest an approximate hour, but again, this whole side of Orlais seems to exist in the perpetual purplish-blue glow that could either be a summerlike post-dusk or a winterly pre-dawn.

The moon isn't much help in the hourly matter either, but the light that it borrows from its counterpart - still buried somewhere beneath the sand dunes at the horizon - has definitely helped your exploration of the area a great deal. Not to mention, that seeing it so full and glorious, creates an ambiance that you couldn't help but find (since the very first time you took in the sight of it at night) so wonderfully suggestive.

_And also terribly romantic..._

"It's so beautiful out here."

Your heart does a somersault the moment you hear that voice.

You look around, following the trails of its sound and searching in the partial darkness until you find her; the lone figure sitting- perched on one of the upturned pillars half-swallowed by the sand that no doubt used to signal the entrance of the crypt a few hundred years ago - just on the slope of a dune a few feet above on your right, cast in the otherwordly green glow of a veilfire brazer lit nearby.

The light plays glimmering tricks on the exotic golden ornamentation of the Orlaisian velveteen shawl that she has wrapped around her shoulders to ward off the biting chill that takes over the area at night to compensate for the punishing, scalding heat that simmers mercilessly during the rest of the day, and her hair - free of the pins that usually holds it up in a practical bun - cascades down her back, fluttering languidly in the nightly breeze.

It's chilly.

The temperature has clearly dropped by several degrees during the evening. Low enough that even with the rage and concern boiling within you, the nip of the wind brushing against your bare skin compels you to slip (with just a bit of difficulty and a muted grimace) into your leather doublet.

You do so by keeping your eyes firmly trained on her for the entire time as you approach her. Not daring to look anywhere else. As if she might be a vision- a mirage that could disappear with the next gust of wind or if you were to blink.

She is staring off somewhere in the distance and you can tell, by the tilt of her head, that she is admiring the outline of the triplet formation of Sunstop Mountain.

"Do you think they were shaped by the wind and weather over millennia, or the dwarves carved them out from something bigger?" She asks pensively, sensing your approach, and just knowing (rightly so) that you have already caught up with the thoughts in her head simply by guessing the direction of her gaze.

So great is the relief that fills your heart upon seeing her there, of hearing her voice, that for a moment you almost forget how livid you are with the woman.

That tight coil in your chest loosens ever so slightly. Just enough to allow you to breathe for the very first time since you've rolled off the sarcophagus and recollected your scattered, hazed memories about what happened.

"It wouldn't surprise me if they did." You answer with barely any conscious thought at all, finally daring to take in the surroundings and let your eyes properly adjust to the partial darkness. Memories surface at the suggestiveness of the view offered.

In a way, despite all the differences that couldn't be more obvious, this place reminds you so much of Emprise du Lion.

So silent and still all around.

The wind hissing through the trees and sprinkling the snow gathered on the evergreen's branches there, here replaced by sand getting swept from wherever surface of ancient ruin it lays upon.

So many similarities.

 _And one that is one too many,_ you think, as you come to a stop behind her.

Because you have been here before.

Albeit, role reversed; when _she_ was the one doing the recklessness and almost ended up plunging into a frozen lake.

"You shouldn't be up already." She states, gaze still fixed forward, pensive, voice matter-of-fact, but not bothering to hide the obvious weariness weighing in the words when she speaks.

There is a growing sense of trepidation that you can't quite explain swelling uncomfortably behind your sternum as you circle the pillar to face her.

And in the moment you do, you know the feeling wasn't unwarranted.

The flames of veilfire burning and flickering in the brazier nearby should envelop everything in a pleasant, lukewarm glow. But the sight it provides you with when Evelyn dares, tentatively, to glance up at you, has your stomach churn with acid.

Her skin - usually a soft beige that has tanned into a warmer, exquisite, slightly darker, honeyed shade during your time here in the desert - looks alarmingly pale.

And you don't know whether it is a trick played by the contrast of light and shadows or what, but her eyes lack of that particular, unique _glint_ that makes them sparkle like raw sapphires in a way that never fails to elicit a flutter in your heart. The light they reflect back at you now is hollow and spent and _wrong_.

You don't make a sound, but the worry must show on your face and in the sudden stillness of your entire body because she doesn't wait a moment longer to reassure you.

"I'm all right."

She looks and sounds like anything but. And you don't know whether it is physical, or emotional, or _both_.

That flicker of anger inside you flares anew with a roar.

Your gaze hardens. Your jaw clenches. And she seems to make herself even smaller under the harsh intensity of your scrutiny.

But most of all, the way she folds into herself at your presence and reaction, makes her look so very, very afraid.

A chilly gust of wind prompts her to wrap the shawl tighter around herself, and just like that, the simple gesture draws your attention to her hands, and, more specifically, to the bandage that you notice peeking out from under one of her sleeves.

A chill pervades your entire being at the sight of it. Something that has nothing to do with the crisp night air. 

It petrifies you on the spot. Abating that vengeful fire simmering in your veins.

_She really did it..._

Never before has a makeshift bandage, a knotted strip of white cotton, clashed so awfully with ring velvet and provoked such an unsettling feeling to stir deep within you with such rebellion.

You feel suddenly a bit lightheaded.  
But despite the way your stomach churns and your skin crawls, you know that this time the familiar combination of sensations has nothing to do with the effects of the antidote eating away the poison running through your system, and instead has everything to do with the stain of blood that you see spotting the bandage.

The ultimate proof of what she has done.

You had your whole tirade ready. But _now..._

Now that you see her _like this-_

There is only one feeling that overwhelms the dizziness and anger and sickening helplessness that has impaired you more than the venom ever could have.

You stride towards her and, without preamble, without the most minimal hesitation, you take her hands into your own and drop onto your knees before her, submitting to that _pull_ , to that primal need of closeness and reassurance that has dragged you down that stone slab and drawn you out here, _to her_. The need that has called you to her with the same irresistible, compelling hum of a siren, all while steering away from the thick fog of venom-induced nightmares.

It still shakes a vital part of you though, hearing the gasp that falls from her lips at the contact. Seeing the surprise widening (and finally _brightening_ ) those stunning blue eyes. As if she expected you to not even look at her. Least of all get near her. Or _touch her._

And just like that, the rage that was wreaking havoc within you (a great deal of which directed towards yourself, for indirectly forcing her to rely on such... _methods_ ) evaporates and gets swept away by the next gust of wind.

It's unsettling, realizing that it took you so little to see how shaky your convictions on the matter truly are.

"I'm all right, Cassandra." Evelyn repeats, but her voice sounds so small and quiet when it usually is loud and exuberant and rich and confident and oh-so-vibrantly _inspiring_ with emotions - that you wouldn't recognize her if she weren't sitting right in front of you.

Unable to hold eye contact, your gaze instinctively falls once again on the bandages wrapped around her wrist, and that something awful contorts once again in your stomach at the sight of them- at the feeling of them under your fingertips when you roll up her sleeve to examine them more closely.

_Guilt._

You recognize it for what it is as it tries to crawl its way up your throat, tightening it into a knot.

Because for how involuntarily and indirectly, _you_ are responsible for this. _You_ are to blame.

You can't think of it as any different as if you had laid a hand on her yourself.

The thought, the knowledge, _the realization_ , makes you _sick._

A wave of nausea nearly overwhelms you. But you manage to fight it with determination.

"You foolish woman..." You chastise under your breath- a far cry from the fuming tirade you first intended to deliver -shaking your head in self-reprimand as you run your thumb delicately across the bandages, struggling to swallow the acid burning in the back of your throat at the sight of dried blood. "What have you done."

And even though you don't pose it as a question, the answer doesn't delay to come.

"What I had to do."

The confidence that was lacking from her voice but a minute ago suddenly returns with the kind of firmness that makes her sound so much like the Evelyn Trevelyan you know; the leader you follow and serve.

"I was careful." She says before you can object to her (questionable) assessment. Her words calm and even, measured and sincere. And the quiet urgency that you hear coming from her actually has you believe that they aren't merely words.

And you should know better. 

Because hers rarely are.

_Still..._

"How can you be sure?"

It simply tumbles directly from your thoughts and through your lips.

And for a moment, she looks hurt. It flashes across her face as an expression that seems to reflect a most pained and heartbreaking "you don't trust me." And in that moment, you regret blurting that question and triggering such a response. 

No matter what, your doubt shouldn't earn you such pain. _Ever._

There is no taking it back now, but before you are even given the chance to rephrase and cast away that shade of hurt, she sighs and, with enviable patience, explains.

"The Fade," She starts, voice still strained with weariness, but when she speaks, her words are clear and confident. "It's in perpetual change. It shapes around us, and we all perceive it differently," She means mages, obviously, since they are the only ones with a constant connection to what lies beyond the Veil. 

"It's due to our emotions. And while I was... _watching over_ you by holding you into that stasis field, I didn't draw from the Fade with the thought- with _the fear_ of losing you. That's why no ill-intended spirit got near me. They sense these things. Infinitely more than us mortals ever could."

That's... only partially comforting, and more doubts inevitably spring up from such an explanation, but you don't have to collect your thoughts into order and utter even a word that Evelyn, knowingly, continues by making a comparison you can more easily grasp.

"Just like you have your shields and your various blades and your special abilities, we mages have our magic. Just like you choose your weapons accordingly to the circumstances we might find ourselves into, I select which spells to cast based on the natural elements surrounding me. But this time... This time I was in need of an edge. Of something sharper and unconventional that would aid me as I _needed it_ to aid me at the time. But that's all it has been for me." 

_"It"_ as in blood magic.

Not even she seems willing to voice it for what it is though. (You wonder if it is for your benefit).

"It was nothing less and nothing more than a tool."

It takes some effort; to push aside all of your beliefs and convictions, all of the Chantry teachings and warnings about the subject and simply absorb her words for the meaning they hold and not merely judge the act itself based on years of experience and what has been instilled into you through a most traumatic loss.

But you do.

You _try._

You weight each word with her motivation.

And the effort must be visible, because it earns you a small, tremulous smile.

"Magic is just like any other weapon, Cassandra." She says, so matter of fact and with such conviction that for a moment you almost feel like an ignorant child who is being told that a blade doesn't kill on its own, but that it's the person wielding it who does. 

"Sure, only mages can wield it, and I know that's what scares regular people the most; the fact that you can't and will never fully understand it."

"I'm not-" Your inevitable knee-jerk reaction protest gets immediately brushed aside, not unkindly, but with the gentle urgency in order not to digress from the topic under discussion.

" _But..._ Just like you can use one of your swords to fight, to cut down a tree for shelter or to build a fire, to kill an animal for food and sustenance... you can also use it _to protect_ someone."

You almost stagger.

For a moment you actually lose balance.

It really shouldn't come as such a grandiose epiphany, but the realization of what she is saying, the _understanding_ , slaps you in the face with the blinding clarity of irrefutable logic that you can't believe you have missed this entire time.

Her smile twitches tentatively a bit wider upon seeing such realization finally, _finally_ sink in under all the prejudice and teaching and weariness that the Chantry has imposed upon you and deliberately making you blind to the other half of the truth. 

It may not have been intentional from their part, but the result has surely made you as such. (And with you, inevitably, so many, many others).

"Magic or blades," Evelyn continues, "They are all just tools. What really changes are the circumstances we find ourselves using them in. And more importantly than that, what really matters in the end, are our _intentions_ with them. And _my_ intention today, was to _save you_."

_Maker..._

She makes it sound so defensible and earnest and...

And why would you _doubt_ her?

The sting in your eyes makes you realize that you have been staring at her, captivated, unblinkingly, this entire time.

The weight of such revelation had you dazed, petrified in place.

You blink out of your stupor, somehow managing to dislodge the feeling enough to ask - as if in search of an additional reassurance, "S-so you didn't... You _haven't_..." Your voice is raw and scrapy, but that's not why you let the question trail off, unable to bring yourself to finish it out loud.

Luckily, perceptive as she is, Evelyn understands immediately what you are most desperate to know.

"No, love." She shakes her head, that same painfully tentative, loving smile gracing her lips as she reaches out with her free hand to cup your cheek in her palm. "I didn't summon anything." Never one to dance around the subject, she provides the answer to the question you were far too afraid to ask, and your resolve gets further torn when you find yourself stuck in between wanting and _not_ wanting to know what she went through.

Inevitably- _selfishly_ , your need for reassurance prevails, and so, you let her continue.

"No demon approached me."

You are reluctant to let that thing coiled behind your sternum to loosen some more, but it happens in spite of your willingness (or lack of).

"I didn't _ask_ for any favor."

One more taut string unravels.

"I just... I just used my own blood as raw mana."

And just like that, it tightens and recoils once more on itself.

You shut your eyes at the image and swallow what feels like the thickness of your own pounding heart back down in your chest.

 _Her_ blood.

The _tool_.

You remember the sound of a sharp blade slicing into soft flesh and, instinctively, reach once again for her wrist. Gingerly stroking the bandages there.

It should be far more relieving hearing her saying these things.

But there is a part of you that still can't help but wonder if she may be lying.

Because, after all, if she was willing to rely on such a forbidden... _practice_... in order to save you, to keep you alive long enough for The Iron Bull to deliver the antidote and for it to take effect... then what would a mere _lie_ be in comparison?

And yet... when you finally dare to look up at her again, you don't even have to search her eyes for the lie hiding behind the conviction and firmness of her gaze. Because there simply is _no lie_ to be found. Just fear shimmering in unshed tears.

"If I had another choice..." She stops there, dips her head, and shakes it. "Please," She begs, words cracking under the crushing weight of emotion. "Please, believe me."

Your very soul _bleeds_ at the request, at hearing that tone and having that desperately-pleading look aimed at you.

"If that was the only option," You start, calmly, ignoring the way your own voice shakes, swallowing your nerves despite already knowing the kind of reaction that what you are about to say is going to elicit. "Then perhaps you should have just let me-"

And just as you had anticipated, the suggestion gets promptly severed by the same vehemence you would have mustered were she the one making it.

"Not a chance." She hisses, drawing her hands back and clenching them into fists. And when a few moments ago her eyes were shimmering with tears, your suggestion has them blazing with fire. " _Never_."

That look and the newly regained firmness in her voice stuns you into silence, which is only swept away by a fresh gust of wind.

"I'm not going to apologize," She says eventually, sniffling and hurriedly wiping away the lonely tear that tumbles down her cheek when she blinks. "So if that is what you are waiting for, then you'll be disappointed. Because I could never regret what I have done.

"And the fact that you are here now, _alive_... it is proof that it was the right choice. That I managed to borrow more time; enough for Bull to find his way back in the storm and give you the antidote."

She takes a shaky breath, straightens her back, and looks at you with all her resoluteness.

"I could never regret it." She states conclusively, although, this time, as she says it, despite her defiant posture, the firmness and conviction in her voice find a contrast with the slight, emotional wobble of her chin that she doesn't manage to stop until after you have noticed it.

You close your eyes and heave a long, pensive (resigned) sigh.

A conversation you had with her right before departing for this region suddenly flares in your mind like a beacon, casting off the shadows of your doubts and pointing you in the right direction.

What were the exact words you said to her?

Oh, yes.

_"...now my faith demands that I see with better eyes."_

And maybe the time has come. Maybe it is right now that you must shed some of those convictions imposed by the old Chantry and open your mind to something that has always frightened you; something that has remained hidden in that same deep place that the trauma of losing your brother (and everything that has revolved around it) has resided for all this time.

Maybe this has all happened so that you would finally do so and _see_.

Maybe this is the chance from which you can't turn back, the one you are forced to face and- _no_.

No, you are not so narcissistic to actually believe it has all revolved around what has happened to you today. Although... the thought is there, not so easy to dismiss as you would like.  
It persists, and it has your mind inevitably wander to the ramifications of all the previously avoided possibilities and missed chances where you could have done _more_ , been _better_.

As minutes tick by, Evelyn seems to interpret your silence and the way you have retreated into yourself and into your own personal spiral of doubts, as something else entirely.

Something you had no intention to make her believe.

"I understand if you need time to process all of this and-"

"I don't." You interrupt. Only realizing that your abrupt, curt answer might have (rather than affirm the reassurance you wanted to deliver) contributed in giving her the wrong idea when you see the way she ducks her head and gulps thickly.

"O- _oh_..."

And then she laughs.

An awful, broken, wet, breathy little sound that pierces right through you and stuns and disorients you briefly with a fog of confusion.

"I can't say part of me didn't _expect it_ , or wasn't even prepared for it. I mean... I knew- I _knew_ that if I _didn't_ do it I would have lost you. I just... I guess I wasn't prepared to... lose you _like_ -"

Hardly have you ever witnessed her having trouble expressing herself. While your lack of eloquence is nothing surprising, hers is quite alarming.  
But right now she keeps swallowing her words, as if unable to bring herself to say them out loud. However, it doesn't take much for you to guess what she might be referring to with such hesitation. You manage to grasp the meaning in them despite it. And that heartbroken look speaks for itself.

Your concern morphs into something else as that mist of confusion starts to clear and you realize that she must have terribly misunderstood your previous answer. (Same as you have her previous question).

"Evelyn-"

"No, I understand." She doesn't let you continue. Standing and stepping a few feet away, putting some distance between your bodies, facing the expanse of the desert, and using its vast, calm emptiness to collect her thoughts while yours race frantically all around. With one more insistent than the others. Your heart breaking all over again.

You know what she is thinking.

What she has misinterpreted.

And that thought is even more excruciating than the feeling of the arrow being yanked off your shoulder. It leaves you just as sick to the stomach as the memory of the poison coursing through your veins, and with an even more unbearable, tender, raw hollowness carved in your chest.

Your lips part with the urgency to explain, but she beats you to it once more.

"I know what you believe in. And I know this is definitely... a deal-breaker for you. I was aware of that when I went through with my decision- and make no mistake, it was _my_ decision. And it didn't stop me," She says, shrugging unapologetically, but when she turns around to face you, you immediately notice the fresh tears pooling in her eyes.

"Because rather than dead, I'll have you alive and _despise me_ forev-"

 _Enough_.

You can't listen to this anymore.

You can't stand to see her like this for a second longer.

And you can't bear the thought of her thinking _that-_

With an amount of strength and agility you have not yet recovered, you pull yourself up and stride towards her, as if propelled by the feeling swelling and tearing itself from inside your chest, compelling you to close the distance and (ignoring the pain shooting down your arm from your injured shoulder at the movement) cup her face in both your palms, press your chapped, dry lips against her soft, sweet ones, and _kiss her_ with everything that you are. Making sure that there are no more misunderstandings.

The unexpectedness startles her into stillness at first.

But when she responds - her arms wrapping around you with a naturalness of their own - she gives back just as much as you pour into her. A desperate fierceness and ardor that devours anything in its wake. Brighter than that, there is only the scorching burn of your mutual affection.

She sobs in your mouth and shakes in your arms as she clings onto you as if you could change your mind, confirm her worst fear, and vanish any moment.

Feeling her like this... so yearning, relieved, and desperate at once, has both the power to mend your heart and shatter it all over again.

When you part, it is with extreme reluctance, and only because your still-recovering lungs can't starve of air for a second longer. And the fact that Evelyn herself is left panting softly in the aftermath, says exactly how passionate and consuming your kiss was.

_Good._

There is no doubt about what you meant to convey with it then.

As you regain your breath, you lean in closer to one another, resting your foreheads together.

 _"Don't you ever suggest I could feel anything other than love for you."_ The subtle burning in your recovering lungs and the knot tightening your throat prevent you from actually saying the words, but you think them loudly enough for her to hear, to reinforce the meaning of the kiss, to take away that doubt and fear you have unwillingly - regretfully - sparked in her.

Evelyn's hands cup your face, fingers tracing its contours, and even though her eyes are still closed, she seems to marvel just at the feeling of you; warm and soft and _alive_ under her fingertips.

You know it because you have done the same thing with her, more than once, usually (but not exclusively) after a particularly tough battle. To bask in the comforting wholeness and safeness of each other.

The long, slightly shaky exhale that slips from her lips is filled with relief, confirming your assessment about that need for physical contact.

"No demon approached me, Cassandra." She is the first daring to break the silence, voice raw and hoarse with the same multitude of emotions raging within you. "I _swear_."

Similarly to her, you too release one long steadying breath through your nose as you consider her words.

 _Maybe it was the Anchor,_ you think.

Perhaps the mark has granted her some sort of... _immunity._

But the thought gets dismissed just as quickly as it came when you are reminded of your meeting with the Augur of Stone-Bear Hold, who said that to the spirits of the Fade the Anchor appears (and draws them to it) like a glowing beacon.

The woman who _"blazes like fire",_ indeed.

And not exclusively to spirits.

It's not a line of thought that grants your mind any peace. And it's not like you can simply dismiss it along with your doubts, but... Evelyn is looking at you with nothing but the utmost sincerity, and a silent plea for you to believe her, which clashes so painfully against that burning kind of affection that you know is just as dangerous and deadly as a weapon if something or someone would ever get in between.

They coexist.

You can't simply choose one and cast off the other.

The lengths she has gone through to ensure your safety says all there is to say about the depths of her affection; so profound that is almost unsettling. Like standing on the precipice of a cliff and looking down at the bottomless abyss wating below.

So you take them both. Believing in the sincerity rippling in the precious blue of her eyes.

Because you are willing to try and see it from her point of view. You owe it to her as much as you do it to yourself and the faith you have poured into her.

"Don't you ever suggest or even _think_ of doing such a thing ever again." You warn, plea, threaten, _beg_ her.

The question is the same.

_Would you have gone through every desperate measure there is in order to save her?_

The very fact that you have actually thrown yourself at her, used your own body as a   
shield, should say enough. But... Would you have tried means that your morality refuses? That your own faith forbids and condemns?

It's not the answer what makes you uneasy.

It's the effortlessness and conviction with which you reach that firm, unyielding, conclusive and utterly absolute _"yes"_ that goes right against some of your deepest beliefs.

You can't quite bring yourself to admit it out loud though. Right now, it would be more than you can handle.

"I just... I don't want you to do anything like that ever again." You repeat, because she hasn't answered- promised you yet. "Not for me. Not for _anyone_."

You can't even bring yourself to imagine what would have happened if control had slipped from her grasp, if her emotions had steered towards the kind of fear and guilt and desperation that would have caught the attention of a demon. You don't want to think what would have happened if she had succumbed to its tricky words and turned into an _a-_

No.

_No._

You will your thoughts not to go _there_. To stay in the present. But the present has Evelyn smiling at you that infinitely tender smile that has her eyes soften adoringly into an impossibly beautiful shade of blue that is almost as limpid as that stip of sky stretching far at the horizon.

In its tenderness, that look is more than enough to wrack havoc inside you.

Oh, how do you wish you had the power to hate it right now...

Because you know what it means.

"You know that I would be lying if I made you such a promise, love."

There it is.

The touch of her hand as she toys with the edge of the bandage poking out from your doublet's collar, makes that statement even louder. Delivering it with a conviction that is even more vicious than it would have been if she were to shout those words at you in anger.

The wind lifts again, and you take advantage of the cool air blown your way to draw in a breath, and if you happen to lean against her hand a bit, it's mostly an instinctual gesture, and honestly, the comfort that you receive from the touch is exactly what you need to help you smooth over the raw, tender feelings that your conversation (and the last events of the day in general) have left in their wake.

 _What are you ever going to do with her,_ you wonder, releasing a sigh.

It doesn't end here. But while you'll surely need to return to the topic and re-examine it along with her questionable choices and the summit of all of your mixed emotions - at the moment you are in a desperate need to change the conversation and divert it towards a less dire subject.

"Is there any other confession you wish to make at this time while we are at it?" You not-quite tease her, feeling a bit more put together, enough to fully face her.

Perceptive as she is, you are not even surprised that she instantly catches that note of seriousness hiding behind the feeble humor you tried to weave into such question.

She shifts her mouth from side to side, as if searching for words- for a way to properly shape them and take off some bluntness from whatever it is she has decided to tell you before deciding to take you up on your offer.

"I'm going to give my support to Leliana as next Divine."

It's the nature of the subject that catches you a bit by surprise rather than the admittance in itself.

If anything though, it surely helps in diverting your attention into something else of import that thankfully isn't as loaded of foreboding as your most recent endeavors.

_As for the confession..._

After the conversation you had at Skyhold, you would be lying if you said that you weren't expecting her to support your fellow Hand.

"Because she would see the Circles eradicated and all the mages set free." You state with a nod, hoping that the words come out as understanding and matter-of-factly rather than veiled with a non-existent edge of accusation.

Your difference of opinion may have been loud on occasions, but it has never, ever interfered with what you feel for her.

Evelyn shifts on the spot. Gaze cast downwards. Brow lightly crinkled as she stares thoughtfully at her sand-dusted quillback leather boots, as if the shiny Lazurite buckles there were to shimmer the answer back at her.

"That's... one of the most compelling statements that she has made on the subject, yes," She agrees eventually. And... you understand.

It's a unique chance.

"I know your view on the matter, and I know how you view us mages," She says and you are about ready to interject in defense or... denial, but she doesn't give you the occasion to trip over your own words in a fumbled attempt, pressing a gently silencing finger against your lips. "But we _do_ deserve a chance to govern ourselves. To be _free_."

And there, upon hearing those words, the hope held in that statement, glimmering in her eyes, the sympathy and fiery passion quivering in her voice for her fellow mages possibly -finally- having this opportunity... for a moment, you feel a bit ashamed for having been part of the very same organization that, ages ago, has seen to their imprisonment.

Longing for freedom and having a purpose that isn't restricted to the confines of a tower- to rules agreed upon by an institution meant to chastise and shame and persecute those born with a gift that is more often than not (and rather conveniently) considered a curse... Well, it's not something that can be denied. You know that. You always have, despite what your traumatic past may hold and what your faith dictated.

You suddenly feel all the more grateful for having been entrusted to the Seekers all those years ago. The lesser evil, in her eyes, you think, compared to the Templars.

Maker knows what kind of vengeful person you would have become were you to join them instead and surrender to that kind of all-consuming hatred that you have felt towards mages when your brother was murdered, instead of being offered the occasion to understand what made some of the mages desperate enough to dwell into the most dangerous folds of forbidden magic.

"Although... Leliana's revolutionary plans regarding my brothers and sisters aren't the only reason why I'll endorse her and push for the grand clerics to choose her." Evelyn continues, tearing you away from the depths of a thought you have seldomly dared to explore in your career as Seeker, worried of the possible, compromising, blinding-white sympathy that you would have found lying at the bottom of a seemingly endless scale of grays and that would have interfered with what your faith and duty demanded of you.

You merely have time to process her words and express your puzzlement with a furrowed brow that she hastes to explain.

"Something... _happened_... in Valance, when I accompanied her." She says, uncharacteristically cryptic. "A situation that she admitted would have ended badly if I hadn't been there with her to... restrain her."

_Oh._

She needn't say any more.

Your whole expression instantly softens with understanding.

Sister Nightingale's resolve threatening to tip towards her other self's less... diplomatic and more direct, violent inclinations, is not something that comes with such a surprise to you.

"After we sent word to The Hero Of Ferelden, I received a letter where Warden-Commander Amell asked me to help Leliana _"find her way back into the light"_ in case she, and her faith, would falter."

It's always been hard, even for you, to separate the Nightingale from Leliana the person, not Left Hand, not former bard, not "scheming spymaster gathering piles of secrets for blackmail and plotting assassinations whenever even Lady Montilyet's most diplomatic skills fail the Inquisition's efforts" (however rare the case might be).

A surge of relief washes over you then, just as the information properly sinks in.   
Not-so-unexpectedly, for knowing that you won't have to take part in any of the duties that the next Divine will have to deal with. From the Thedas-changing decisions, to the unbearably trivial and time-consuming affairs involving nobility and favoritism and politics for which you have never developed any kind of patience.

Conclusively, _it's probably for the best,_ you reason. Only realizing that you must have uttered your response out loud when you glance up and are met by the look of surprise on Evelyn's face.

"And here I thought you would at least resent me, even just a little, over this."

You shrug. Because you don't. Not in the least. But it's not like you can make her believe it so easily, especially after the deadly stunt she pulled so recently.

"I made a previous commitment to rebuild the Seekers," You remind her as an excuse, even though the Seekers aren't the only purpose you have now.

"Besides," You continue, trying not to smirk in advance knowing the kind of reaction that your comment is most likely going to receive. "Obnoxiously large hats don't suit me. And someone has to keep you out of trouble, or at least be there at your side to pull you out of it when you'll innocently stumble right into one." The _"of your own making"_ part remains unspoken, but you can definitely tell - from the way she gasps with indignation, eyes wide and offended - that it was as if you had uttered the accusation out loud.

"That barely happens _twice_ in one day anymore!" She defends with all of her passion. And there she _is_.

That's the woman you know and love and would follow to the end of the world.

Shining through, at last. In all her splendor.

Laughing makes your wounded, tender shoulder sting with a shock of pain that radiates all the way down your arm and into your hand, but you simply can't contain the amusement that blooms in your chest upon seeing her looking and sounding so offended at the mention of her occasional clumsiness and penchant for finding herself perpetually surrounded by some kind of enemy or wild, fang-y predator.

Although, in all fairness, it's not like you can pin it on her (personally) the fact that you are constantly in danger, but rather on the Inquisition and its vast, colorful assortment of enemies that sometimes _may_ include dragons and wyverns and other wild, unfriendly creatures that you never fail to encounter in your travels.

"Besides," She presses on, features schooled with the kind of determination that shows her intention to prove a point (even if the sly little smirk flashing briefly through the facade anticipates _exactly_ what is going to come next).

"If I hadn't _stumbled_ in the damsel in distress part once or twice in order to give you a nudge towards at least admitting that you liked me a little, you would still be trying to figure it out on your own."

Most likely, yes.

(You'll never voice out loud how true such assessment is though).

 _Maker..._ The way she can turn the tables around so quickly is among one of those skills in her possession that you haven't quite gotten used to. It's quite infuriating. And it honestly leaves you a bit dizzy; the effortlessness with which she does it, leaving you struggling to regain your balance when a moment ago you thought you had finally gained the upper hand.

You growl. It irks you like few things can.

She surely has learned how to be an excellent strategist. And you can't help but wonder which one of your three Advisors is the most responsible for helping her uncover such a talent. (Your coins' on Josephine).

It's Evelyn's turn to chuckle at your flustered muttering.

She steps closer and with her usual, enviable smoothness, she takes advantage of what you now believe was a totally orchestrated moment of distraction to tip her head and capture your lips into a kiss.

The _sneak_.

Not that you'll ever dare to protest, of course.

(And not like she needed an excuse, either).

It still catches you a bit by surprise though. But given the way your body instantly responds as soon as you register the warm, sweet pressure of her lips against yours, folding around hers with such instinct, you clearly aren't as surprised by the gesture as your initial reaction might have suggested.

Just like that, the traces of mild annoyance evaporate into thin air.

Your uninjured arm wraps instinctively around her slender waist, holding her close while your other hand delicately cups her jaw, promptly, happily, deepening the kiss at the first brush of her tongue along your bottom lip.

The warmth of her affection surrounds you and envelops your senses, curling inside you and healing the raw scrapes left by the realization- by the _knowledge_ that she's willing to risk her life (along with putting in jeopardy her very own, invaluable sense of self) to save yours. 

_...Just like you are to save hers._

You can't even pretend to think otherwise.

Your very actions prove as much.

And it would be just as hypocritical of you not to forgive her.

The thought is still deeply unsettling, and even though you both know you'll have to discuss the extent of her decisions and risks, the sensation weaving through your being is the sweetest you have ever experienced.

It still feels so _new_.

And you can't help but marvel in realizing that, after all that happened, trading a simple kiss is more than enough for you to get a feeling of her very, untainted, bright-as-ever essence.

It's truly all you need to draw comfort.

She feels the same.

Tastes the same.

Loves you more ardently than ever.

And so do you.

When you part, there is a small, but utterly blissed smile on her lips that reaches her eyes, makes them crinkle at the corners and sparkle in that unique way you are so familiar with and has absolutely _everything_ to do with the way your heart starts doing all sorts of acrobatics in your chest.

"Would you do something for me?" She asks all of a sudden, sounding uncharacteristically tentative and hopeful all at once.

Something in the tone has you frown, yet your tongue almost trips over itself in the haste to answer.

"Anything."

She grins then. Mischief and intrigue tainting the innocence that was there but a second ago. She is _definitely_ pocketing your answer for later, when you'll have recovered and feel good enough to be... u-uh... _restrained_. (You suspect that the thing she has for manacles might be related to your very first encounter. It must be some kinky kind of vengeance of some sort from her part. Because you _swear_ that you have never seen her take more delight than when she has you caught, cuffed to the bed, naked and at her mercy, where she can enjoy herself by teasing you and delaying, delaying, _delaying_ your... _release_ ).

You must be blushing something awful thanks to the filthy, wonderful thoughts that have just innocently sneaked into your mind, because when you blink out of that image and your vision finally adjusts to the present reality, the first thing you notice is the way her grin has widened into something feral. Wide enough to show the white flash of her sharp canines.

"Whatever you just thought about, I want you to hold onto it for a little longer, darling." She purrs and winks.

_Andraste's pyre..._

Not even the venom-induced fever has left you feeling so hot and bothered.

You clear your throat and fuss nervously with the collar of your doublet in an attempt to distract yourself from those images and regain a modicum of your crumbling composure.

"What is it you wished to ask of me?"

Thankfully, she decides to take pity on you. Her sly smile abating into something softer as she addresses the matter she originally intended to ask you about.

"Would you please refrain from murdering Varric?"

You groan. Unable not to feel a bit guilty for the murderous way you looked at him when you first woke up.

"It was my decision to make," Evelyn continues, persuading you with an uneasy explanation. "He was there to ensure that nothing would have happened to you in case I- _I..._ you know."

Luckily, she stops herself there with a casual shrug, because your mind was already starting to drift towards a very, extremely dangerous line of thinking that you know you'll have to deal with eventually. Just... not now.

Now is for comfort and reassurance.

There will be time to dwell deeper into all that happened and sort through the feelings you have not yet addressed.

"I really like seeing the two of you getting along." She confesses. "So please, don't let this... _mishap_ interfere with your blossoming friendship."

 _And ongoing forgiveness,_ she doesn't say.

You sigh.

Because you know that nothing that's happened was Varric's fault. And you won't insult Evelyn again by saying that she didn't know what she was doing, or risk hurting her by telling her that she shouldn't have taken such a risk in the first place.

You have reached the conclusion that there is no restraining her. Or the depth of the affection that she has for you.

It's terrifying.

(It's wholly mutual).

 _It was my decision,_ she has said.

...Just like it was _yours_ to throw yourself between her and that arrow.

Discussing it further would only force you into a corner of hypocrisy.

But while frightening, there is a sort of comfort in the knowledge; in knowing what kind of dangers you are both willing to face for each other. It's something that you can't ignore and that makes you feel all warm and tingly inside.

"All right," You yield at last, heaving another sigh. "I'll talk to him later."

She beams. Shifting on her tiptoes to press a grateful kiss on your scarred cheek.

"He is _so_ going to make you the hero in his next serial."

"H-his next serial?" You stutter, but far too caught up in the revelation (and the spike of excitement that it elicits in you) to feel embarrassed about it.

Evelyn hums and nods in confirmation, loosely looping her arms around your neck.

"Brave, strong, dashing princess-warrior fighting alongside her comrade and falling in love with each other throughout their adventures around a world in disarray."

You snort.

And blush.

_Dashing..._

Evelyn looks up at you, all soft relief smoothing her lovely features, and fierce affection blazing in her stunning blue eyes.

At the sight, your heart does that thing again that makes your breath hitch in your throat.

You swallow in a futile attempt to get the feeling in check.

"Sounds like a best seller already." You comment eventually, voice rough, throat crowded with far too many emotions.

"You think he'll grant the protagonists a happy ending this time around?" Evelyn asks, and... there is something, in the tentativeness of the question, and the way she bites at her lower lip with a nervous kind of trepidation and hope, says exactly which protagonists she is referring to in this far-too-obvious comparison.

You reach up with the hand of your uninjured arm and - smiling at this wonderful, amazing, (infuriatingly) brave, fearless woman who is reshaping the world in her hands for the better - brush an errant strand of long, silky-soft, golden-brown hair behind her ear.

"I already know they will."

_The End_


End file.
